[Lnc-business] FW: LPEX and National

Thu Feb 26 17:12:22 EST 2015

I have had hotel and plane reservations for a few weeks now.  The site went
live, I believe, a couple weeks ago.  It still seems premature to expect
state chairs to know how many are going in May, but I certainly have begun
promoting the event in my state and I hope to get commitments soon, at
least from candidates and board members.

By the same logic, I deny that it is 'disgusting' that national has not yet
'automatically' begun to promote an event in May.  In addition, it seems
logical to me that, with an event of this magnitude, staff would consult
with the organizers before promoting it so as to avoid misstatements or
other mistakes.  I would be quite surprised and unhappy if we just started
running ads or something without communication with the LPNV and other
involved parties.  I expect, if we had done that, we'd be seeing angry
comments on statechairs again - and for good reason.

But, let's get past that and ask a simple question.  Are we, or are we not,
going to work together to run serious candidates for winnable offices, and
to elect libertarians to public office in order to move public policy in a
libertarian direction?  That is what I wish to do (although as a board
member I primarily want to govern and serve on committees) and what I think
this party, national and affiliates, should be doing.  That means I agree
with Jason about "chemtrails paper candidates" - although I might point out
that LPUS runs 2 candidates every 4 years, and those candidates have not
been paper candidates or chemtrails candidates.  It also means that I am
excited to see an event that is geared towards teaching people in this
party skills in organizing, campaigning, and governing - if we're going to
elect people to office, we'd be well served to make sure they know how to
do things when they get there - and I thank the organizers for putting it
together.  I'm also glad to see an elected officials panel scheduled for
this event (disclaimer:  I've communicated to the organizers my interest in
being on this panel, and in giving a break-out class on 'the art of
governance') which is not run opposite, say, LNC elections.

I hope that everyone in this party can get on board with these being
important things to teach, and electing people to office being an important
thing to do (although I know not everyone agrees it should be the highest
priority.)  Taking a break from my praise for this event, which I am
excited to attend, I would note that the statechairs email listed many
things being done, all of them great - but none of them mentioned electoral
politics.  If affiliates want to focus on other things (and an event to
train candidates nationwide is a great thing to focus on) or act as a
lobbying organization, so be it, but it's not quite the same goal as
electing people to office.  I don't care what affiliates do, but I'd
encourage this board to shift our focus away from the multiple things we
focus on, and towards encouraging affiliates to elect people to office, and
building and sustaining an infrastructure of support that makes that
possible.  We've already taken a great step in that direction, as urged by
our chair, through our involvement in ballot access fights and the
commitment to stick with fights we get involved with.  Affiliates need to
know that, when we say we're in, we're in, and we will stick with them
until the end.  I am proud, for instance, that we stood with NY through
their legal battles.

I also wish we could agree on this goal, and then pursue it in unity with
our affiliates, without having a continuous pissing contest between
affiliates and national.  We can do better, but so can affiliates that find
themselves in attack mode all too frequently.

Joshua Katz

Joshua A. Katz

Region 8 (Region of Badassdom) Alternate
Libertarian National Committee

Chair, Libertarian Party of Connecticut

On Thu, Feb 26, 2015 at 1:44 PM, Nicholas Sarwark <chair at lp.org> wrote:

> To clarify, there have been at least 18 emails to the state chairs list
> since January 15 that mention LPEX, an official announcement from the
> California LP of their convention sent February 2 that also announces LPEX,
> an article published in the January LP News promoting LPEX, articles on IPR
> about LPEX, and publicly available announcements on the LPEX website (
> http://www.lpex.org/news ) posted on February 12.
>
> Maybe all of those announcements weren't official and "none of the state
> chairs know about LPEX" as Brett claims in his email, but it's not from
> lack of publicity and LPEX is not some kind of under wraps project that Wes
> Benedict let out of the bag by asking the state chairs who is planning to
> attend.
>
> -Nick
>
> On Thu, Feb 26, 2015 at 11:26 AM, Scott L. <scott73 at earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> This is relevant because Mr. Benedict is our Executive Director.
>>
>>
>>
>> Mr. Pojunis sent a private e-mail to the National LP ED and asked Mr.
>> Benedict to call him.
>>
>>
>>
>> I just verified with Brett that instead of calling or e-mailing Mr.
>> Pojunis, Mr. Benedict chose to immediately post the e-mail below
>>
>> to the State Chairs e-mail list.
>>
>>
>>
>> Although I would not use the word “disgusted”, I still sympathize with
>> Mr. Weinman’s comment.  The registration page for LPEX went live only in
>> the last 48 hours,  so it is extremely premature to publicly ask questions
>> like “Are you going?” and  “How many from your state do you expect to
>> go?”
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Normally, I would expect the ED to call the LPEX organizer privately, and
>> ask these same questions.  If the ED did not get satisfactory answers,
>> then, at that point, it might have been appropriate to send the e-mail
>> below to the State Chairs e-mail list.
>>
>>
>>
>> And yes, I know I am giving the RNC and the DNC access to a couple of
>> e-mails from our State Chair’s e-mail list.
>>
>> Don’t blame me – I was very publicly against the auto forward function
>> for the lnc-business e-mail list.
>>
>>
>>
>>   Scott Lieberman
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>  ------------------------------
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Statechairs [mailto:statechairs-bounces at hq.lp.org] *On Behalf Of
>> *Jason Weinman
>> *Sent:* Thursday, February 26, 2015 9:53 AM
>> *To:* Brett H. Pojunis
>> *Cc:* statechairs at hq.lp.org; Nicholas Sarwark
>> *Subject:* Re: [Statechairs] Fwd: LPEX and National
>>
>>
>>
>> Wes, I can't even describe how disgusted I am with that email.
>>
>>      JW
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB
>>
>>
>> On Thursday, February 26, 2015:
>>
>>
>>
>> Wes and State Chairs,
>>
>>
>>
>> First, I called Wes and sent him an email AFTER speaking with our
>> National Chair who suggested I reach out to Wes to work out Nationals
>> involvement, if any. There has not been a full public announcement to the
>> state chairs nor do the state chairs know about LPEX. Therefore, to ask
>> questions about who is attending is premature.
>>
>>
>>
>> The fact that this is not automatically promoted through National is
>> absolutely beyond me. The LNC promotes events like SFL, Free and Equal and
>> many other NON-Libertarian organizations. So not promoting an LSLA,
>> LPNevada and LP California event is absurd.
>>
>>
>>
>> There is no reason to explain the financing, unless of course you did the
>> same with SFL, Free and Equal etc. Here is what I will tell you. I have
>> personally taken the risk and personally signed for this event. I have made
>> a big financial commitment to produce LPEX. No organization is on the hook
>> financially, nor any risk associated with LPEX other than me personally.
>> The LNC has no involvement at this time so how could there possibly be any
>> risk associated with the LNC?
>>
>>
>>
>> The LSLA pledged money to LPEX and that information is publicly available
>> as it is in the minutes. In return there will be fundraising opportunities
>> for the LSLA during LPEX. Unlike in the past, I will be responsible for
>> covering the costs of speakers, trainers, the venue, etc., not the LSLA.
>>
>>
>>
>> Hopefully that satisfies any questions you have.
>>
>>
>>
>> On to LPEX. The primary reason I am organizing this conference is to
>> provide much needed training for Libertarians. Once I get the information
>> out to the state chairs (probably by tomorrow) I would hope state chairs
>> would take advantage of LPEX.
>>
>>
>>
>> Including the National party was probably a bad idea to begin with. The
>> LNC and staff have more pressing issues to address such as our decreasing
>> membership.
>>
>>
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Brett H. Pojunis
>> Chairman of the Libertarian Party of Nevada
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Feb 26, 2015 at 8:58 AM, Wes Benedict <wes.benedict at lp.org>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> State Chairs,
>>
>> Brett Pojunis has asked for my help promoting LPEX. See the note below.
>> My inclination is to help, but first I wanted to get some feedback from the
>> state chairs on this.
>>
>> Are you going?
>> How many from your state do you expect to go?
>> Do you plan to have your state party email your state database about this?
>> Do you mind if LPHQ sends emails to promote this?
>>
>> I don't understand the financing for this project. I'll be asking Brett
>> to explain a bit more about it in writing to the state chairs and the LNC.
>> If turnout is low, is the LSLA at risk financially? If turnout is great,
>> does the LSLA benefit? Who else is at risk? My understanding it that there
>> is and should be no financial risk to the Libertarian National Committee.
>> I'm not certain where I read it or about the amounts, but I think I've read
>> that the LSLA has already contributed around $7,000 for this event.
>>
>>
>> Thanks for your prompt feedback.
>>
>> Wes Benedict, Executive Director
>> Libertarian National Committee, Inc.
>> *New address: 1444 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314*
>> (202) 333-0008 ext. 232, wes.benedict at lp.org
>> facebook.com/libertarians @LPNational
>> Join the Libertarian Party at: http://lp.org/membership
>>
>>
>>
>> VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> -------- Forwarded Message --------
>>
>> *Subject: *
>>
>> LPEX and National
>>
>> *Date: *
>>
>> Thu, 26 Feb 2015 06:16:47 -0800
>>
>> *From: *
>>
>> Brett H. Pojunis <brett at pojunis.com>
>>
>> *To: *
>>
>> Wes Benedict <wes.benedict at lp.org>, Nicholas Sarwark <nsarwark at gmail.com>
>>
>>
>>
>> Hi Wes,
>>
>>
>>
>> Could you please give me a call when you get a chance. I would like to
>> see if we can get National's assistance next week with promotion for LPEX.
>>
>>
>>
>> There are some major updates and we have some real value for Libertarians.
>>
>>
>>
>> The best number for me is 702.325.7426, thanks.
>>
>>
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Brett H. Pojunis
>> Chairman of the Libertarian Party of Nevada
>>
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>>
>>
>
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