[Lnc-business] LNC Member Blogging

Wed Jul 30 14:06:16 EDT 2014

    While I am fully in favor of anyone exercising their freedom of speech,LNC members publishing articles on the
official Libertarian Party blog would have to be taken by any reasonable person as official statements from the LNC.  As such, they would be subject to censorship review by us.  It is so easy for anyone to set up their own blog or participate in others, but, if someone considered it so important to publish their opinion in the official Libertarian Party blog, I would be willing to give them a fair hearing to facilitate a decision granting unanimous consent.

Ron Windeler
rowindeler at aol.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Alicia Mattson <agmattson at gmail.com>
To: lnc-business <lnc-business at hq.lp.org>
Sent: Wed, Jul 30, 2014 1:48 am
Subject: Re: [Lnc-business] LNC Member Blogging

Let me point out a couple of things that may not occur to you when you first hear this idea:

1.  This could change the focus of the LNC and distract us from important work we need to get done.  It risks LNC members spending their time perfecting whatever self-indulgent blog post we want to make next week rather that doing our other jobs.

To keep the LNC more focused on party management issues like affiliate and candidate support, fundraising, etc. rather than just issuing public policy statements all day long, the delegates have given us a bylaw that makes it hard for the LNC to adopt public policy resolutions.  Article 8.11 says it takes a 3/4 vote with previous notice or unanimous consent without previous notice.

By allowing LNC members to post blog entries whenever they please, we are essentially opening the door for a single LNC member to make public policy statements without any input at all from the rest of the LNC.

Public policy statements should be left to staff, to be done in line with the party platform, etc.  We have different types of work to do.

2.  One of the reasons this has been a problem in the past is that there are some propriety issues that are difficult to navigate.

We have LNC policies that require we not use our positions to give ourselves advantages for election at convention.

See Policy Manual Sections 2.08.2 (Limitations on Party Support for Public Office) and 2.09.5 (Limitations on Party Support for Party Office).

When it gets closer to convention time, if any of us is running for re-election, then we have the question of whether 2.09.5 requires that blog posting privileges also be extended to any other candidate for that office.  And there will be disputes about when someone becomes a candidate.  Is it when others suspect they will run, or when they officially state they are running?  Non-LNC members who declare intentions to run will do so early just to demand the same posting privileges enjoyed by LNC members.  But an LNC member could merely not declare their intentions so as to say they're not yet a candidate for party office, thus the policy doesn't apply to anyone running for their current position.

These are real disputes that came up in the past, and they were solved by shutting down blog posting by LNC members.

Then there were disputes about subtle (and not-so-subtle) content that could be viewed as an LNC member campaigning for either themselves or their favorite candidate.  I can recall one instance of an announcement of a "service" being offered by a particular campaign, and having to debate whether it was party news to let people know of the beneficial service or whether is was just plugging the campaign to give the candidate increased exposure before the convention.

Because some people took advantage of the policy more than others did, there were complaints about that sort of imbalance as being more beneficial to someone they didn't personally like.

That is how a seemingly simple idea can get very messy and contentious.

-Alicia

On Tue, Jul 29, 2014 at 7:44 PM, Nicholas Sarwark <chair at lp.org> wrote:

All,
Is there interest from LNC members in publishing articles on the
official Libertarian Party blog?

My understanding is that LNC members had done so in the past, but the
policy had been changed for a number of reasons and that was stopped.

If there is interest, I would be inclined to open it up to LNC members
to post, within certain guidelines, e.g. directly applicable to the
Libertarian Party, and in line with our overall messaging, positive,
etc.  Posts would be subject to APRC review as well.

-Nick

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