Poll: Should grassroots organize the march, or HQ?

[thoughtbombing]

I can't explain why he made it sound like he came up with the idea. Maybe he was thinking about it for a long time and when Bryan brought it up to him, it clicked for him. But I've already proven that this originated with the grassroots. I don't know what else you want me to say about it.

I guess we'll have 2 marches on Washington, then... personally, I think we need to camp outside the white house.

 

[Deborah K]

I guess we'll have 2 marches on Washington, then... personally, I think we need to camp outside the white house.

I presume if HQ hijacks this event, that we will merge our efforts with them, not have a separate march.

Time will tell.

 

[thoughtbombing]

sarcasm on my part... forgot the obligitory emoticon

 

[Luft97]

I posted this elsewhere but it really pertains to this thread changed a little bit.

Why is it you people are trying to hijack Ron Paul and his message? You should all be ashamed. Some of you talk about bringing your guns.. Bringing your 9-11 truther signs... Bringing Alex Jones and his bullhorn so he can tell us all that we are an army.. Bringing all of your masks, well you better get ready for a riot and some serious blowback.

Ask yourself what are your intentions? What is your end goal? What is the most strategic way I can obtain my end goal?

If getting the crap kicked out of yourself by the cops or maybe you have a death wish and you want to test Bush's executive order powers then by all means plan your own rally away from Ron Paul..

Otherwise stop it with all of this crazed talk.

This needs to be a rally planned for and BY Ron Paul for his campaign for president.

The End

 

[Karrl]

Simple answer---BOTH

Doesnt have to be one or the other. Who cares who came up with the idea first!!

Co operation

 

[Banana]

Ditto.

I have a sense that they had to do some things for sake of legitimacy/effiency/whatever, but nothing's stopping grassroot from expanding onto this.

 

[jrich4rpaul]

I posted this elsewhere but it really pertains to this thread changed a little bit.

Why is it you people are trying to hijack Ron Paul and his message? You should all be ashamed. Some of you talk about bringing your guns.. Bringing your 9-11 truther signs... Bringing Alex Jones and his bullhorn so he can tell us all that we are an army.. Bringing all of your masks, well you better get ready for a riot and some serious blowback.

Ask yourself what are your intentions? What is your end goal? What is the most strategic way I can obtain my end goal?

If getting the crap kicked out of yourself by the cops or maybe you have a death wish and you want to test Bush's executive order powers then by all means plan your own rally away from Ron Paul..

Otherwise stop it with all of this crazed talk.

This needs to be a rally planned for and BY Ron Paul for his campaign for president.

The End

My goal is to get Ron Paul elected President, so I agree with you. I fear many people use this campaign as a way to express their own agenda and violently abuse the term "freedom of speech". How about "freedom to act responsibly"? Pulling crazy shit in the name of the Constitution (bringing guns?) is just going to start something violent, and no one seems to care how it makes our Presidential candidate look. How can people call themselves Ron Paul supporters when they don't care how they make him look?

The first time I heard about this march was from Ron Paul, saying it was a march to show his support. I don't get why that's so hard to process. I support Ron Paul's planning of this event.

 

[Xenophage]

It needs to be a cooperative effort. "Grassroots" is not a collective entity that gets things done. Individuals get things done, and we have people on both the HQ and Grassroots sides doing things.

Having Ron Paul declare a date is perfect. There seemed to be no end in sight to the arguments over this.

 

[Deborah K]

The first time I heard about this march was from Ron Paul, saying it was a march to show his support. I don't get why that's so hard to process. I support Ron Paul's planning of this event.

This was a grassroots idea.

Here is how this all came about:

Ron Paul was on a conference call held by Restore the Republic (I believe) on 2/7/08. Ron Paul radio was simulcasting the call. Ray Powell and Bryan Siemon were the talk show hosts at the time. Bryan mentioned having a march that day, and the next day he put up www.revolutionmarch.com

A listener to the program posted the website here on 2/8/08: http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=116152

Then, on 2/11/08 HQ posted Ron Paul's "Go the Distance" speech. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryMliyeIDp4

Ron Paul says right in his "Go the Distance" speech that this is about the message. He does not imply in any way, shape, or form that this is a campaign rally.

 

[Deborah K]

Also, the grassroots has no problem with Ron Paul planning this. The problem lies with HQ planning it.

 

[JS4Pat]

HQ for sure.

WTF????

HQs has screwed up nearly everything they have touched in this campaign.

What is wrong with you??????

 

[Strike-Fighter]

Both, HQ needs to get permits, to get the word out most effectively, to organize everything that grassroots simply can't. But HQ is nothing without grassroot energy, attendance, and funding. And look at the last really successful thing the grassroots did. It was in December...

Work together: this is the one time we need to be collectivist Note that it's voluntary and done in the private sector...

 

[Deborah K]

to organize everything that grassroots simply can't. .

uhhh.... would you mind elaborating on this please? What makes you think this cannot be done by the grassroots? Do you not realize that we are made up of some very successful, organized professionals? Does it not occur to you that all of the positions that need to be filled for a planning committee can be filled by the grassroots??? We are LEGIONS!!!!

Where is the love? I swear I've never seen such lack of faith. Dr. Paul believes in the ability of the people, but some of us can't seem to muster up any belief in ourselves.

 

[Strike-Fighter]

uhhh.... would you mind elaborating on this please? What makes you think this cannot be done by the grassroots? Do you not realize that we are made up of some very successful, organized professionals? Does it not occur to you that all of the positions that need to be filled for a planning committee can be filled by the grassroots??? We are LEGIONS!!!!

Where is the love? I swear I've never seen such lack of faith. Dr. Paul believes in the ability of the people, but some of us can't seem to muster up any belief in ourselves.

HQ should buy the permit and see whatever else is needed. Grassroots efforts don't offer legitimacy for a lot of people. If the campaign puts a hand in this it'll be more successful. Grassroots does wonders getting other people to come and showing up itself, but when it comes down to it, do you follow Ron Paul or his supporter? For a lot of people who don't spend as much time in the grassroots as we do, it's the former.

The point is that neither entity can do it alone as well as the two could work together. The HQ will be great for getting RP supporters out. The grassroots will be good at getting say, Obama supporters involved, as an anti-war rally, and Huckabee supporters involved as a pro-conservative rally. The more people we get the more legit the march is.

As for your second point, I admit that I have very little faith in the ability of people. But let it be known that I hold Ron Paul people in high esteem over the rest of the people.

 

[Deborah K]

HQ should buy the permit and see whatever else is needed. Grassroots efforts don't offer legitimacy for a lot of people. If the campaign puts a hand in this it'll be more successful. Grassroots does wonders getting other people to come and showing up itself, but when it comes down to it, do you follow Ron Paul or his supporter? For a lot of people who don't spend as much time in the grassroots as we do, it's the former.

The point is that neither entity can do it alone as well as the two could work together. The HQ will be great for getting RP supporters out. The grassroots will be good at getting say, Obama supporters involved, as an anti-war rally, and Huckabee supporters involved as a pro-conservative rally. The more people we get the more legit the march is.

As for your second point, I admit that I have very little faith in the ability of people. But let it be known that I hold Ron Paul people in high esteem over the rest of the people.

I respectfully disagree with you on two points: If HQ gets their hands on this, I predict, based on their handling of the Philly rally etc. it will be only a modest success if not a failure. Second, I highly doubt that people are going to be using who organizes the event as a litmus test to determine whether or not they'll show up. They'll see what the grassroots is accomplishing and they'll see all the people who are involved and marching and they'll want to be a part of it.

As I stated, I don't have a problem at all with working with HQ on this, I just don't think it's a wise move for them to take it over. NOT Ron Paul - but HQ! I think their time is better spent putting kick-butt ads together that compare Ron Paul to McCain.

 

[thoughtbombing]

uhhh.... would you mind elaborating on this please? What makes you think this cannot be done by the grassroots? Do you not realize that we are made up of some very successful, organized professionals? Does it not occur to you that all of the positions that need to be filled for a planning committee can be filled by the grassroots??? We are LEGIONS!!!!

Where is the love? I swear I've never seen such lack of faith. Dr. Paul believes in the ability of the people, but some of us can't seem to muster up any belief in ourselves.

I've Co-Chaired some decent sized festivals, and we have more resources than the campaign... they have to focus on PA, Texas, etc... they have a campaign to run, we have a massive movement to run... Ron Paul is but ONE congressman of many running to represent our movement here.

 

[Karrl]

Deborah K

It is also my impression that RP was talking about the message and not the campaign.

Is it not possible they both had the same idea? Why the power struggle over the idea?

I didnt read anywhere that strikeforce said the grassroots couldn't it. \

Like I said before.... it's a co operation.

 

[MrZach]

Neither. The campaign doesn't need to spend its time and resources planning and organizing this, and we don't need a bunch of self-declared "experts" (idiots) trying to run the show and piss all over each other for "supremacy of say" OR trying to follow the expert "democratic" results of polling from a few RonPaulForum.com junkies....

That being said, someone with the credentials, the time, and the know-how should put together a professional team of people to organize this. We aren't going to get jack squat done if everyone keeps thinking they are suddenly "qualified" to do this because they are a HUGE Ron Paul fan or something...

And in this case, QUANTITY does not make up for QUALITY. Just because you have 100 guys each with 1% of a clue doesn't mean you get 100% of a clue - you just have 100 guys with maybe slightly more than 1% of clue...

Sorry to be so cynical, but I really want to see this happen, and pretty much 99.9% of the people around here aren't going to put this together on hopes dreams and "Ron Paul Spirit" alone...

 

[Banana]

Deborah K, if this is so important to you, why don't you gather a bunch of people you want to work and get with HQ and work out something?

I'd think it's important that you be upfront with the HQ, and I'm sure we can come up with a reasonable approach. Who knows? Maybe HQ has some reasons for needing to organize the event?

 

[Deborah K]

Deborah K, if this is so important to you, why don't you gather a bunch of people you want to work and get with HQ and work out something?

I'd think it's important that you be upfront with the HQ, and I'm sure we can come up with a reasonable approach. Who knows? Maybe HQ has some reasons for needing to organize the event?

You need to get with the program.. LOL just kidden. It's already being done. We've got the website, we've formed a committee, we've contacted HQ and we're waiting to hear back from them.

The website, btw, was up and running 3 days before Ron Paul made his "Go the Distance" speech.

If you look through my posts, you'll find one on how this all began.