POLITICO: Ron Paul aides ponder ‘frustrating’ race

[FrancisMarion]

Why 20 pages? It's simple

There has been massive fraud that has cost us several states. If you are not willing to acknowledge this reality, please refrain from spreading your nutjob conspiracy theories on this forum. We want the lurkers and new members to know the truth. Have a nice day.

And we are suppose to the be the antithesis of sheep...... gimme a break. Please turn on your sarcasm font. Its needed.

 

[robskicks]

And we are suppose to the be the antithesis of sheep...... gimme a break. Please turn on your sarcasm font. Its needed.

Hey everybody, his username is FrancisMarion!!

 

[wgadget]

And we are suppose to the be the antithesis of sheep...... gimme a break. Please turn on your sarcasm font. Its needed.

So, Francis...Ever attended a GOP delegate meeting?

 

[LittleLightShining]

County coordinators on the ground working contacts and expanding the support. When we found new people (or they found us) we encouraged them to do what they were comfortable doing, be it sign waves, graphic design, door to door canvassing, etc. We had a great relationship with the grassroots in NH so we were able to recover lots of materials from them and we also developed our own.

We recognized that Vermont is a place with a specific demographic and an open primary and we aimed to maximize the impact of that by Vermontifying the message. We developed our own tri-fold briochure specific to us (our graphic designer wants to help other states with this). We got a much better reception with it than we did from the superbrochure. The official campaign materials were also very conservative oriented and would only play well in certain areas here.

We were out in force at a big gun show and handed out flyers to people highlighting RP's positions on the 2nd amendment. We had volunteers at the Northeastern Organic Farming Association conference with agriculture specific information. We made outreach efforts with Occupiers and anti-war independents and Democrats and Progressives. (Most Dem crossovers went to Santorum. There was a concerted effort here.) Grassroots folks attended meetings of various tea party groups, property rights groups, homeschool groups, churches, etc.

We had a lot of sign waves (in Caledonia county where I am we often had 20+/- people) where we showed our neighbors that there really was a lot of support for Ron Paul. We asked and asked for the voter tracker lists from the campaign since working in NH but we didn't get them until about 9 days before the primary so targeted canvassing wasn't done as much as we would have liked to, though we did cover a huge amount of ground (check out the map: http://www.google.com/elections/ed/us/results?gclid=CLGY4seWla4CFecQNAod_h-pfa) first with blanket door to door and then with more targeted lists.

We raised our own money (a few thousand bucks) had our brochures printed, made radio spots that ran on 7 radio stations, put advertisements in a few papers and made sure people heard the message. We bought signs, buttons, bumper stickers, pole signs, flyers, etc.

Bonus was the campaign coming in with the voter tracker, desperately needed signs (we were all but out of the 400+ signs that folks bought and the hundreds more we were able to glean from NH) and airing "The Plan" on a few different tv stations.

We made our best effort to make sure there was some Ron Paul presence at every polling place (even if it was just a sign). Having voter tracker earlier in VT would have helped us make sure we had no town unmanned because we would have been able to id a few supporters in each town but that's a lesson for other states to benefit from. We could have won, I wish I would have handled college outreach better, I know now what I will do next time.

I have one town here I question the vote (St Johnsbury) just because of the experience we had canvassing this area and living near enough to understand the demographic. Otherwise I am not concerned about fraud in Vermont. Romney is though. He's crying fould over the fact that he didn't win here http://vtdigger.org/2012/03/08/super-tuesday-recap-vermont-gop-chair-wants-examination-of-voter-irregularities-ron-paul-siphons-ballots-from-romney/

This is a war. When you make a plan and find that when put into action it's not yielding the results you expected you need to readjust. OPEN primaries are where we win and prove to the GOP that they can't do it without the Ron Paul voters.

Anyway, if there are any grassroots folks left out there willing to dig in and hit the pavement-- not sit home and make phone calls-- we in Vermont offer our experience and whatever skills we can to whoever really wants to win.

 

[wgadget]

Idea:

Someone should make a video or DVD that can go viral explaining how the GOP has treated us Paul supporters in the past campaigns (2008 and 2012, complete with all dirty tricks and questionable tactics) and we should one-on-one tell our neighbors and friends that we will be TAKING ON THE ESTABLISHMENT at the National Convention. Use it to collect DONATIONS, in order to tell even MORE people...A pyramid scheme of sorts.

Explain that we're WORKING FOR THEM against The Man.

 

[D.A.S.]

County coordinators on the ground working contacts and expanding the support. When we found new people (or they found us) we encouraged them to do what they were comfortable doing, be it sign waves, graphic design, door to door canvassing, etc. We had a great relationship with the grassroots in NH so we were able to recover lots of materials from them and we also developed our own.

We recognized that Vermont is a place with a specific demographic and an open primary and we aimed to maximize the impact of that by Vermontifying the message. We developed our own tri-fold briochure specific to us (our graphic designer wants to help other states with this). We got a much better reception with it than we did from the superbrochure. The official campaign materials were also very conservative oriented and would only play well in certain areas here.

We were out in force at a big gun show and handed out flyers to people highlighting RP's positions on the 2nd amendment. We had volunteers at the Northeastern Organic Farming Association conference with agriculture specific information. We made outreach efforts with Occupiers and anti-war independents and Democrats and Progressives. (Most Dem crossovers went to Santorum. There was a concerted effort here.) Grassroots folks attended meetings of various tea party groups, property rights groups, homeschool groups, churches, etc.

We had a lot of sign waves (in Caledonia county where I am we often had 20+/- people) where we showed our neighbors that there really was a lot of support for Ron Paul. We asked and asked for the voter tracker lists from the campaign since working in NH but we didn't get them until about 9 days before the primary so targeted canvassing wasn't done as much as we would have liked to, though we did cover a huge amount of ground (check out the map: http://www.google.com/elections/ed/us/results?gclid=CLGY4seWla4CFecQNAod_h-pfa) first with blanket door to door and then with more targeted lists.

We raised our own money (a few thousand bucks) had our brochures printed, made radio spots that ran on 7 radio stations, put advertisements in a few papers and made sure people heard the message. We bought signs, buttons, bumper stickers, pole signs, flyers, etc.

Bonus was the campaign coming in with the voter tracker, desperately needed signs (we were all but out of the 400+ signs that folks bought and the hundreds more we were able to glean from NH) and airing "The Plan" on a few different tv stations.

We made our best effort to make sure there was some Ron Paul presence at every polling place (even if it was just a sign). Having voter tracker earlier in VT would have helped us make sure we had no town unmanned because we would have been able to id a few supporters in each town but that's a lesson for other states to benefit from. We could have won, I wish I would have handled college outreach better, I know now what I will do next time.

I have one town here I question the vote (St Johnsbury) just because of the experience we had canvassing this area and living near enough to understand the demographic. Otherwise I am not concerned about fraud in Vermont. Romney is though. He's crying fould over the fact that he didn't win here http://vtdigger.org/2012/03/08/super-tuesday-recap-vermont-gop-chair-wants-examination-of-voter-irregularities-ron-paul-siphons-ballots-from-romney/

This is a war. When you make a plan and find that when put into action it's not yielding the results you expected you need to readjust. OPEN primaries are where we win and prove to the GOP that they can't do it without the Ron Paul voters.

Anyway, if there are any grassroots folks left out there willing to dig in and hit the pavement-- not sit home and make phone calls-- we in Vermont offer our experience and whatever skills we can to whoever really wants to win.

Amazing work. You need to write a manual on this because it sounds like VT grassroots was incredibly organized state-wide. A lot of people across the country do sign waves, but the success of sign-waving is certainly nowhere near active outreach like lit distribution and door-to-door canvassing.

I'm in NJ, obviously, and it's a semi-closed primary (Unaffiliated voters are also allowed to vote Republican), and a large cross-section of the state consists of Obama-lite establishment Republicans, probably strong Romney presence here in a large portion of the state.

I'd love to have a look at your brochure because the VT demographic may very well apply here in NJ to a large extent.

 

[Keith and stuff]

(Most Dem crossovers went to Santorum. There was a concerted effort here.)

Thank you for the efforts in VT. +Rep. The only question I have is that exit polls show that the plurality Dem crossover went to Paul. They also show that the Independents went to Paul more than anyone else, and we know that most Independents in VT typically vote Democratic. Ron Paul's high vote total in VT wouldn't have been possible if there was a competitive Democratic Primary. There was a Democratic Primary but only Obama's name was on the ballot.

http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/primaries/epolls/vt

Vote by Party ID
Democrat
Paul 42%
Santorum 26%
Romeny 15%

Vote by Party ID
Independent
Paul 38%
Santorum 21%
Romeny 31%

Vote by Party ID
Republican
Paul 13%
Santorum 25%
Romeny 52%

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politic...dependents-shape-the-race-in-vermont-primary/

Forty-one percent GOP primary voters in the state described themselves as Independents, vastly higher than the 23 percent of independents voting in the state’s open primary in 2008.

Independents lean Democratic. However, since the Democratic Primary wasn't competitive (with just Obama on the ballot), many Independents voted for Paul because of military and other issues.

 

[tfurrh]

THE BLAME GAME ↓

 

[Cabal]

lol @ everyone in this thread looking for someone to blame...

RP and his supporters have set out to effectively infiltrate the most powerful, organized, and influential criminal syndicate in the history of man (the State)... and you guys are wondering who is to blame for our lack of success: the youth, or the elderly, or the women, or the media, or Doug Wead, or Jesse Benton, or the GOP, or on and on and on...

You're ignoring the elephant in the room--the State.

 

[LittleLightShining]

Amazing work. You need to write a manual on this because it sounds like VT grassroots was incredibly organized state-wide. A lot of people across the country do sign waves, but the success of sign-waving is certainly nowhere near active outreach like lit distribution and door-to-door canvassing.

I'm in NJ, obviously, and it's a semi-closed primary (Unaffiliated voters are also allowed to vote Republican), and a large cross-section of the state consists of Obama-lite establishment Republicans, probably strong Romney presence here in a large portion of the state.

I'd love to have a look at your brochure because the VT demographic may very well apply here in NJ to a large extent.

Thanks

You can find the brochure in the Grassroots Resources section of www.ronpaulvermont.com . The file is very large so don't panic if your puter slows down when you're downloading it. Please join our VT meetup if you want to talk to more people www.meetup.com/vt4rp2012 . This brochure can be changed to target NJ better. We included sections on family farms (germane to VT) and also Corporate Personhood because that was a ballot issue in 53 towns. Ironically, Ron Paul won 53 towns (not all the same).

BTW I have a lot of family in NJ and the majority are Ron Paul supporters

 

[LittleLightShining]

Thank you for the efforts in VT. +Rep. The only question I have is that exit polls show that the plurality Dem crossover went to Paul. They also show that the Independents went to Paul more than anyone else, and we know that most Independents in VT typically vote Democratic. Ron Paul's high vote total in VT wouldn't have been possible if there was a competitive Democratic Primary. There was a Democratic Primary but only Obama's name was on the ballot.

http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/primaries/epolls/vt

Vote by Party ID
Democrat
Paul 42%
Santorum 26%
Romeny 15%

Vote by Party ID
Independent
Paul 38%
Santorum 21%
Romeny 31%

Vote by Party ID
Republican
Paul 13%
Santorum 25%
Romeny 52%

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politic...dependents-shape-the-race-in-vermont-primary/

Independents lean Democratic. However, since the Democratic Primary wasn't competitive (with just Obama on the ballot), many Independents voted for Paul because of military and other issues.

Exit polls weren't conducted in all areas. Obama still got 29k votes in his primary. Those are the solid, not going anywhere Dems. Paul Dems are a whole different breed. They don't all want Obama to win. They would never vote for another Republican but Ron Paul's message speaks to them. And so did we. And so we will continue to do.

 

[parocks]

The campaign targeted not young people in IA, NH, SC, NV, CO, MN and WA. Yet we lost, even though the campaign focused almost all of it's efforts in those states on old people. It seems that no matter how much the campaign targets old people (that is the main focus on the campaign, without a doubt), old people don't vote for Paul. Will the campaign continue to but almost all of it's efforts into old people? I don't know but my guess is yes.

Right. Just because Young People LIKE Ron Paul and vote for him does not mean that the campaign is focusing on them.

 

[BUSHLIED]

Right. Just because Young People LIKE Ron Paul and vote for him does not mean that the campaign is focusing on them.

There is only so much direct mailers to old people can do. You have to meet them and tailor your message to address their concerns.

 

[parocks]

County coordinators on the ground working contacts and expanding the support. When we found new people (or they found us) we encouraged them to do what they were comfortable doing, be it sign waves, graphic design, door to door canvassing, etc. We had a great relationship with the grassroots in NH so we were able to recover lots of materials from them and we also developed our own.

We recognized that Vermont is a place with a specific demographic and an open primary and we aimed to maximize the impact of that by Vermontifying the message. We developed our own tri-fold briochure specific to us (our graphic designer wants to help other states with this). We got a much better reception with it than we did from the superbrochure. The official campaign materials were also very conservative oriented and would only play well in certain areas here.

We were out in force at a big gun show and handed out flyers to people highlighting RP's positions on the 2nd amendment. We had volunteers at the Northeastern Organic Farming Association conference with agriculture specific information. We made outreach efforts with Occupiers and anti-war independents and Democrats and Progressives. (Most Dem crossovers went to Santorum. There was a concerted effort here.) Grassroots folks attended meetings of various tea party groups, property rights groups, homeschool groups, churches, etc.

We had a lot of sign waves (in Caledonia county where I am we often had 20+/- people) where we showed our neighbors that there really was a lot of support for Ron Paul. We asked and asked for the voter tracker lists from the campaign since working in NH but we didn't get them until about 9 days before the primary so targeted canvassing wasn't done as much as we would have liked to, though we did cover a huge amount of ground (check out the map: http://www.google.com/elections/ed/us/results?gclid=CLGY4seWla4CFecQNAod_h-pfa) first with blanket door to door and then with more targeted lists.

We raised our own money (a few thousand bucks) had our brochures printed, made radio spots that ran on 7 radio stations, put advertisements in a few papers and made sure people heard the message. We bought signs, buttons, bumper stickers, pole signs, flyers, etc.

Bonus was the campaign coming in with the voter tracker, desperately needed signs (we were all but out of the 400+ signs that folks bought and the hundreds more we were able to glean from NH) and airing "The Plan" on a few different tv stations.

We made our best effort to make sure there was some Ron Paul presence at every polling place (even if it was just a sign). Having voter tracker earlier in VT would have helped us make sure we had no town unmanned because we would have been able to id a few supporters in each town but that's a lesson for other states to benefit from. We could have won, I wish I would have handled college outreach better, I know now what I will do next time.

I have one town here I question the vote (St Johnsbury) just because of the experience we had canvassing this area and living near enough to understand the demographic. Otherwise I am not concerned about fraud in Vermont. Romney is though. He's crying fould over the fact that he didn't win here http://vtdigger.org/2012/03/08/super-tuesday-recap-vermont-gop-chair-wants-examination-of-voter-irregularities-ron-paul-siphons-ballots-from-romney/

This is a war. When you make a plan and find that when put into action it's not yielding the results you expected you need to readjust. OPEN primaries are where we win and prove to the GOP that they can't do it without the Ron Paul voters.

Anyway, if there are any grassroots folks left out there willing to dig in and hit the pavement-- not sit home and make phone calls-- we in Vermont offer our experience and whatever skills we can to whoever really wants to win.

Here's the problem. You did a lot of work. And nothing that you did screams stupid. That happens a lot with grassroots. But I don't see it here. So I'm not saying that.

However. Just skip all that. We've seen exit poll after exit poll showing that we do best with 18-29 males. Did you do anything to Get Them To The Polls. GOTV.

Start with GOTV. Start with the assumption that those 18-29 year olds like Ron Paul, but don't vote as frequently. Start w/ "how do we get those 18-29 year old males to the polls on election day" or "how do we get those 18-29 year old males to vote".

What you did do was vague persuasion. Going here, or there, and try to convince random people to like Ron Paul a little more than they did.

Random, scattershot persuasion doesn't work. It's what everyone does, in every state, and it doesn't work. It seems like a reasonable thing to do. But it doesn't work.

Start with "we need to get our supporters to the polls, we need them to vote". Don't start with anything else. If you can't see how what you're doing increases turnout, they quit it. It's just not as efficient.

Vermont. Everything should've been University of Vermont. You mentioned that you explicitly ignored the colleges, but that, really, is all you should do.

It's always good to think "where is the one place where there a lot of Ron Paul supporters, and what can we do, starting now, to get them voted".

And then you save up money. And then come up with a plan. And implement that plan. I'm not criticizing you. You did what everyone else did. You DIDN"T target young voters. That's for sure. So if anyone says there was too much targeting of young voters, they were just wrong.

 

[klamath]

Here's the problem. You did a lot of work. And nothing that you did screams stupid. That happens a lot with grassroots. But I don't see it here. So I'm not saying that.

However. Just skip all that. We've seen exit poll after exit poll showing that we do best with 18-29 males. Did you do anything to Get Them To The Polls. GOTV.

Start with GOTV. Start with the assumption that those 18-29 year olds like Ron Paul, but don't vote as frequently. Start w/ "how do we get those 18-29 year old males to the polls on election day" or "how do we get those 18-29 year old males to vote".

What you did do was vague persuasion. Going here, or there, and try to convince random people to like Ron Paul a little more than they did.

Random, scattershot persuasion doesn't work. It's what everyone does, in every state, and it doesn't work. It seems like a reasonable thing to do. But it doesn't work.

Start with "we need to get our supporters to the polls, we need them to vote". Don't start with anything else. If you can't see how what you're doing increases turnout, they quit it. It's just not as efficient.

Vermont. Everything should've been University of Vermont. You mentioned that you explicitly ignored the colleges, but that, really, is all you should do.

It's always good to think "where is the one place where there a lot of Ron Paul supporters, and what can we do, starting now, to get them voted".

And then you save up money. And then come up with a plan. And implement that plan. I'm not criticizing you. You did what everyone else did. You DIDN"T target young voters. That's for sure. So if anyone says there was too much targeting of young voters, they were just wrong.

And how many times do people have point out to you that there are NOT enough 18 to 29 year old REPUBLICAN voters to elect RP even if ever last one of them voted for him. The majority of them do not vote or vote for democrats.

 

[parocks]

There is only so much direct mailers to old people can do. You have to meet them and tailor your message to address their concerns.

Or skip them entirely, including skipping the mailers. We aren't sending mailers to Young People, we ARE sending mailers to Old People.

Take the money that is wasted on Old People, and put it into special GOTV for Young People. They like us, they just need help voting. That help costs money.

In Georgia - we got 1% 65+, 24% 18-29

 

[parocks]

And how many times do people have point out to you that there are NOT enough 18 to 29 year old REPUBLICAN voters to elect RP even if ever last one of them voted for him. The majority of them do not vote or vote for democrats.

We could pick up what we need elsewhere, without effort, based on the fact that Ron Paul does have support in all age categories.

18-29 males. Add some 18-29 females. Add some 30-44 males. Etc.

I'm saying we are leaving votes on the table, because our GOTV is inadequate to turn out the people who will vote for us. That's what we're lacking.

We're having the same version of the same argument. The fact is that we don't spend enough money on young people. And too much on old.

ALL POLLS indicate that they younger you are, the more likely you'll vote for Ron Paul. And that's not because Ron Paul is targeting young people.

It's really simple.

Young Men LIKE Freedom.
Old Women LIKE Security.

The main point is that no amount of minor tweaks to Ron Paul's message, or long drawn out converstatios over the course of weeks are going to make old people prefer something that they just don't prefer.

 

[Johnny Appleseed]

Devine intervention.

 

[parocks]

lol @ everyone in this thread looking for someone to blame...

RP and his supporters have set out to effectively infiltrate the most powerful, organized, and influential criminal syndicate in the history of man (the State)... and you guys are wondering who is to blame for our lack of success: the youth, or the elderly, or the women, or the media, or Doug Wead, or Jesse Benton, or the GOP, or on and on and on...

You're ignoring the elephant in the room--the State.

Right, whether you call it the state, or whoever else. But that's not within our control. And Young vs Old is such a common thread there, where there are people on each side, falling back on the same argument.

How about this. The Fed would probably kill Ron Paul before he became President. They just wouldn't allow it. So, there's that.

But we still have to work. And we're talking about the difference between winning 1 state and winning 0 states

If we did win Iowa or succeed in any not ignorable way, they would have a lot more shit to throw at us. The belief that we would have any type of smooth sailing
if we just did one thing is wrong. We'd be gathering evidence of how far they would go to stop us. We're doing that now.

 

[klamath]

We could pick up what we need elsewhere, without effort, based on the fact that Ron Paul does have support in all age categories.

18-29 males. Add some 18-29 females. Add some 30-44 males. Etc.

I'm saying we are leaving votes on the table, because our GOTV is inadequate to turn out the people who will vote for us. That's what we're lacking.

We're having the same version of the same argument. The fact is that we don't spend enough money on young people. And too much on old.

ALL POLLS indicate that they younger you are, the more likely you'll vote for Ron Paul. And that's not because Ron Paul is targeting young people.

It's really simple.

Young Men LIKE Freedom.
Old Women LIKE Security.The main point is that no amount of minor tweaks to Ron Paul's message, or long drawn out converstatios over the course of weeks are going to make old people prefer something that they just don't prefer.

And you are very very arrogent. for every 1 -18 year old you get to the polls you have driven 5 older people away from RP. I challenge you to go up to a older, rural, republican woman and make that statement to her face, You just might find yourself screaming for security.