Campus Reform
So, former employer LI launched campus reform, which I spoke about briefly before.
Doesn't seem too bad, and looks nice. It's certainly better than the disaster that was their previous websites, and I sincerely wish them the best.
Now, that being said, I want to do a little experiment. And this is an awful thing to do with real people, but here it goes:
Given LI's ridiculously high turnover rate, spurred in no small part to previous horrendous management (some of which has undoubtedly, itself, already turned over), I wonder how long the existing staff will have before they turnover themselves. This could be from overwork, underpay, I won't speculate why, but I will say from having run enough political shops that constant turnover means perpetual ineffectiveness.
So, let's check back at the 6 month and 12 month marker from today: March 18, 2010 and June 18, 2010.
Here's the list of 11 Campus Services Coordinators (if you're one of them and reading this, I am kind of sorry for doing this to you):
Cara Eshleman
Matthew Talancy
Michael J. Thompson
Emily Cochran
Matthew Hurtt
W. Westin Bordeaux
Brian Mullis
Brad Tidwell
Amanda Prevette
Lindsay Souza
Tony Listi
Here's to hoping all 11 are still there in a year.
Labels: movement
Unsolicited opinions
The Leadership Institute, a former employer, is
launching a social networking site for campus conservatives. Now this of course comes 5 years after facebook and a few years after the College Republicans tried their own device. I haven't seen 'campus reform' but hope that it's great. The one common denominator I've noticed, and this transcends websites and databases, is that these things are structured never with the end user in mind, but rather, with the organization's needs and desires in mind. If one looks at college students, what are their natural wants and desires, what is their self interest, and how does this work towards it or not address it at all? I suspect, and I feel like I'm always debbie downer with this stuff, that this site will be of rather limited use other than to 100 students across the country who self-select into the universe. A better way to handle the situation would be to create information markets for the database, which is a way of using words I just made up to say that the central infrastucture here could feed into the various groups that already do campus organizing - so let's get to clear examples: setting up a new website that ranks professors, and collects both student information and that information about the specific professor. Or, slightly more controversially, offer a site that posts the papers and exams used in the classes as well. Play into the student's self-interest. Offer a bundle of books at cost and not at the enormous markups charged by their campus bookstore. Then, after doing this, collect the data and find out what students are most passionate about. Use these tactics to cast the widest net and then start bringing these people into the general conservative movement afterwards rather than expecting them to have the desire to advance abstract principles.
But again, no one asked me.
Labels: campuses, movement, organizing
The politicization of... everything
Now not only is the west coast the left coast, which used to be just a snarky joke told among right-wingers and is now apparently a proud self-approved label, but the travel industry is promoting revolution through your airline travel. Perhaps they offer complimentary carbon offsets? The red blurry things are fists, in case you were wondering.
Labels: movement, politicization, politics, society
The fundamental breakdown in conservatism
Since the election, a variety of people have weighed in about what needs to be done. No one reads this blog, but I wanted to collect my thoughts on the matter. I came up with 14 major reforms:
1. Accurately assess blame - it wasn't "conservatism" that lost in the abstract or something as simple as McCain's poorly run campaign, or his moronic decision to abide by the campaign finance laws. No one thing caused this defeat and abstract ideas didn't win or lose either. Obama had more activists who were better trained who were using better technology. When Napoleon lost at Waterloo people didn't say he just had a bad day or that the stars divined it to be so or that the other side played with "heart" - no, a combination of tactics, strategy and technology made the difference between victory and defeat.
2. Retool our movement publications - some people need to be fired. My nominations:
a. National Review - Rich Lowry - Lowry has made the movement standard bearer into the most irrelevant publication possible. The greatest intellectual minds of National Review have gone from Whittaker Chambers and Bill Buckley in the past to Mona Charen and Jonah Goldberg today. It's a disgrace.
b. The American Conservative - Scott McConnell - Contrarian to be contrarian has a special spot in my heart, but the American Conservative, run by a self-described "New York Review of Books liberal" has become intellectually dishonest in how it approaches movement issues. Where it once held a banner of anti-war and immigration to a stupid GOP listening to idiots like Hannity, it has since become a perpetual nonsensical critique of conservatism that simply seeks to validate liberalism in mind and act. I can't remember the last time I read an article of theirs and didn't feel as though they purposefully twisted words and history to suit their desire to critique. Laughably lately, they claim Carter was a real conservative. If I want idiocy I'll read the Nation, thank you.
c. Human Events - Jed Babbin - The commercialism of Human Events emails has become either comical, pathetic or both. Advertising for Extenze and Viagra is likely right around the corner. Babbin writes the most obvious articles with the most underwhelming analysis. The most obvious articles from the most unknown writers, Human Events has become a repository for old news without any interesting angles. Their good talent, namely Amanda Carpenter, left for greener pastures and I frequent their site only to read Buchanan and Novak when he was in better health. Other than that, with contributors as poor as "AWR" Hawkins, I question the publishing proclivities of what should be the best conservative outlet out there.
3. Start using clear metrics - most of our nonprofits have a mailing list and not much else. They need clear metrics measuring results and not activity. They ought to all have some sort of serious field work and focus on outside the beltway strategies rather than all be soundbite factories scurrying to get on Hannity or in print.
4. Develop the youth - serious youth outreach, I could write for weeks on this subject.
5. Test our messages
a. Education
b. Isolationism
c. Streamlining/anti-bureaucracy
d. Family
6. Figure out electronically how to win - I don't want to go into too much detail here, but in 2004 the movement claimed the world would change due to blogs. And then it was social networking. The world hasn't changed, it's just that some things are a bit easier. We need to stop the fascination with pointless technology, i.e. Twitter, and start thinking about how to actually use this technology to convert more people, to take more effective action and to win more elections. Technology is not an end in itself, even though it seems whenever I hear or read people like Saul Anuzius talk about it, that's how it comes across. People don't talk about twitter as a way to test messaging or coordinate a field team; they don't talk about tangible ways to do the basic tasks necessary in order to actually win - it's as though no one has a big picture anymore of how to get back to victory. And those victories will start happening in a specific order:
a. Local
b. State
c. National
And the local places, our first step in this journey, don't have the time or resources for big complicated systems. They need to be able to easily do their current operations and do them better and cheaper. Let's find a way to use technology to win.
7. Develop the donor class
8. Punish our insincere elected officials - let's make a few human sacrifices to keep the base sane. My first nomination? Senator Specter. My second nomination? Senator Hatch. My third nomination? John "Crybaby" Boehner
9. Write out the neocons from the movement and end the fratricide - neocons are leftists, who are we kidding.
10. Develop and start alternative media outlets
11. Focus locally
12. Get serious about training - we are losers who need to learn how to win
13. Means-test our pundits - if you have never done anything with your life, and yes I'm looking at you Sean Hannity, then you don't deserve to have an opinion. I don't like the politics and past employers of people like Patrick Ruffini, but he gets to have an opinion and I'll take it seriously because, well, he's done something. Sean Hannity? barf. Michael Johns? barf. Mona Charen? barf. Being an "author" or an "analyst" or a "speechwriter", by the way, doesn't mean anything. Running a successful competitive election? Yes. Accomplishing real tangible goals against real opposition? Yes. Sucking a paycheck to do what's always been done and lose? No.
14. Focus our efforts on the places the left is weakest
a. Unions
b. Affirmative Action
c. Taxes
d. Life
e. Bureaucracy/Regulations
f. Universities
Labels: conservativism, ideas, movement, theory
Two great groups
It may seem, assuming anyone reads this with any regularity or consistency, that I am overly critical of nonprofits and conservative groups. There are two great groups I want to mention, though, the
Alliance Defense Fund and
Americans United for Life. And the work that the
American Civil Rights Initiative does, working to overturn state race codes one by one, is great as well.
Labels: activism, conservativism, movement, pro-life movement, theory
Center for American "Progress" featured again
Quite the darlings of the media establishment, the Center for American Progress
is profiled again as a central think tank for the incoming Obama administration. Besides profiling budgets, though, the article does somewhat of a sloppy job saying that all these groups produce "ideas" without really giving any indication of what that means. The Center, I will admit, have replicated many of the smart aspects of the conservative movement, and apparently are doing them with relatively little drama, use of new technology, ridiculous turnover and other aspects of conservatives shooting themselves in the feet that I've seen over the past few years. It also, of course, helps that all this is centered in one group well financed and not dependent upon direct mail donors and small donations. The left is using political technology much better than conservatives, and are winning as a result. We have a lot of catch-up to play.
Labels: conservativism, movement, policy, politics
Article: Stages of Radicalization
I've written
an article about my thoughts in radicalizing individual leaders and activists. This is part of my CounterMedia project, which has been slow-going for some time.
Labels: activism, leadership, movement, organizing, strategy, theory
Loyalty and Disloyalty: Goodbye Stevens, too bad we knew thee
Senator Ted Stevens was indicted today, one in a long line of Republicans who have forgotten that they once had principles. I recall going to a fundraising event for Tom DeLay at the height of his corruption probe, put on by various conservatives, and I recall the loyalty asked of us, that even though DeLay was barely a conservative at that point, "he was one of us" and the "other side" is always loyal to their leaders, so we should too, right? And, while I recognize the problems inherent in always casting out the sinners, and in not standing with your own, I don't see anything redeemable about Sen. Stevens. No one among the Senate Republicans, with the
Coburn and
DeMint exceptions, are true leaders on any important topic. Instead, they rise to power and forget their movement, jettison their principles and disdain those who work for anything other than contracts and their piece of the 3 trillion dollar pie. I feel zero loyalty for this man,
this wretch who had the chance to stop abortion, expand gun rights, cut taxes or promote school reform and, instead, busied himself with building bridges to nowhere. Good riddance.
Labels: corruption, movement, politics, Senate
Policy items for the local government activist
For anyone involved in local politics, I think there are a small set of key issues that ought to be on everyone's policy radar:
1. First and foremost: saving babies. And that can be through sensible restrictions on abortion clinics, promoting and supporting Pregnancy Centers, offering support to women through a variety of means including post-abortion counseling, anything that helps women and serves the unborn. Reference my previous posting heralding the first abortion free-state: South Dakota, which accomplished that amazing feat through the law and through reasonable regulations.
the rest are in no particular order:
2. Changing/reforming sexual education in schools
3. Restricting and regulating gambling, ending state lotteries
4. Encouraging school innovation through incentivizing private education
5. Cutting the tax burden on families, especially young families
6. Privatizing the services and functions of local government
7. Energy reform
8. Infrastructure improvements, such as building wider roads, more roads, improving bridges, etc.
9. General beautification through monuments, statues and art
10. Promoting transparency within the government and its functions, such as the police force
11. Removing any and all restrictions and regulations on reporters and the media, such as the oppressive two-party consent laws in 10 states.
Labels: movement, policy, politics
The first abortion-free state: South Dakota, now for some new goals
Planned Parenthood in South Dakota
has recently shut down due to a vigorous informed consent law, so there is plenty of good news. However, this is not the end of the battle, and pro-life and pro-family advocates ought to take things even further and start restricting and regulating all sorts of vice out of town, as these things go together. The pro-life warriors ought to start identifying ways to regulate sex shops, strip clubs and pornography out of their state as well. Kick out the support legs that produce the crises the Planned Parenthood attempts to solve, not to mention reform the government school's sex-ed classes so they don't teach perversion,
as they do in Massachusetts. Our goals should never end at what could be such a transient success, and the folks I worked with in 2006, namely the Unruhs, certainly have the fire in their bellies to keep that revolution marching.
Labels: conservativism, movement, policy, politics, pro-life, pro-life movement
Tom DeLay's ridiculousness: The Coalition for a Conservative Minority
So I was going through a few old issues of Campaigns and Elections and ran across this March article from Tom DeLay about the "High Price of Disunity" and he is so bold as to claim that conservatives were disloyal for not supporting the prescription drug bill. DeLay is still oblivious to his own culpability in creating ultimate Republican defeat. His byline credits his works at the "
Coalition for a Conservative Majority" which I was interested to hear about, so I checked out their website.
They have
eight active chapters. DeLay founded this organization, and
Ken Blackwell is running it.
I decided to
"get active" with CCM and signed up. But I suspect I know what will come from it: nothing. As with most conservative groups I sign up with, I never receive an email or a single contact. There's no use for the volunteer with most of these places,
because people are working a job, sending out their direct mail, and simply disinterested in results.
The only result Tom DeLay can claim is losing a majority, so why does anyone listen to what he has to say, give him any money or look on him with anything but disdain. He is a traitor to the cause and ought to be cast out. You can't call this a movement when the only motion involves money into the pocket of thieves like DeLay. They're supposedly a c4, and supposedly a group to "counter the influence of moveon" even though that mantle is claimed by about a dozen conservative shell groups at this point.
Labels: conservativism, movement, politics, Tom DeLay
Rewards, Action and Rewarding Action
The Gerard Health Foundation announced that they'll be dispersing
$600,000 in pro-life awards in January. This is a great thing for the pro-life movement, and I see this same mentality found at groups like
the Phillips Foundation and their
Ronald Reagan scholarships or the
Sam Adams Alliance and their activism prizes, and the others who have wealth and are rewarding good behavior. They think like a businessman, a donor, who proverbially "puts their money where their mouth is." But too often they lose sight that these people, these individuals, are rarely chosen for their results but rather for their image/brand/appearance. Look at
the winners of the Reagan Scholarships this year, of which I wrote one recommendation letter I should add, and perhaps its a reflection of my own lack of information or of the type of biography that they're writing, but none seem accomplished as an activist. They are good people who are leading good lives, but they are not changing society and changing the world. There's a place for scholarships to reward the good, but I'd say that there ought to be some scholarship that rewards the bold. I respect the sidewalk counselor who saves a child, I respect the Student Government official that brings in a
Pregnancy Resource Forum even though the only result are ideas, I respect an action with a result, a real measurable result that changes the world. I respect an organization that makes a system to achieve results, which I think is always stronger than one person who thinks the right way and markets themselves well. Let's focus on results and not so much the needs of individuals.
The Reagan scholarship and these new Pro-life awards risk only functioning to reward those who are well-connected and who game the system the right way. Neither characteristic is typical of an effective activist. Color me bitter, but I suppose it derives somewhat from the fact that
the one activism event they identified, that of the Planned Parenthood racism project, was misattributed away from my friend James O'Keefe who actually made the calls, cut the videos and took the action, or that it was in concept an idea that James and I alone fleshed out, wrote out and planned out, but all the credit has gone to an individual, Lila Rose, who served primarily as the public face for the operation. I offer these facts not because I want any credit for this, but as an example to show how these sorts of awards that seek to function as replacements for action can come up short. They problem is that because the types of activists out there who really change the world are not the ones busy having lunch with the right foundations, or who have Michelle Malkin's private email address, they are the ones who are out there doing and often, suffering, for their actions. This is not to disparage Lila, whom I consider very intelligent, motivated and committed to pro-life affairs. Rather, this is to say that we only know what we know, and I wonder whether the pro-life movement even has the right judges for this kind of incentive, much less the right nominators, and I hope the right activists. I really admire Ray Ruddy, and I respect his continued massive investments in the pro-life movement, but I'm unsure that this is the right way to help out the pro-life activists around there. There are so few, and most are so ineffective, that there needs to be a creativity revolution within the movement first to start ginning up these activists, there needs to be training and leaders leading by example. I'd be afraid that this will likely end up rewarding those who know how to best market themselves. And this is not Ray's fault, this is the fault of a movement bereft of creativity, devoid of inspirational leadership, and floundering to find a way how to achieve results when they often don't even realize they're looking for results.
Everyone wants to end abortion, but apparently, no one can think of good ways how. I realize the Life Awards will hopefully flesh out those ideas, maybe my critique is more that they'll have the talent to truly pick out the gold from the pyrite and financially enable pro-life revolution rather than subsidizing pro-life ineffectiveness. For my two cents I would say that an effective way to structure the rewards is through anonymous nominations, akin to the Nobel prizes, rather than through asking organizational leaders who will likely only be nominating themselves. Reward the action, not the individual. And first and foremost, invest more than $600k in training pro-life activists how to win the prizes in the first place.
If anyone would like to donate such a sum to me, I'd be honored to radicalize a few hundred people to undertake effective activism.
Labels: movement, pro-life, pro-life movement, scholarships
Acknowledgement: FreedomWorks rocks Dodd's house with a Panda suit
So, being a conservative doesn't always have to be about complaining,
my post a few days ago about the problems of the party in getting the message out included the observation that Sen. Chris Dodd took an illegitimate Countrywide loan, and there was no one covering it. Well, I was wrong like kong, because
FreedomWorks has sent a Panda to Dodd's house of corruption asking Congress to stop PANDAring (pandering) to the mortgage industry, including setting up a website on the subject of the corporate bailouts,
angryrenter.com -- in a sea of conservative movement mediocrity, they stand out like rockstars. Freedomworks gets double points for using a costume, my favorite protest trick in the book, thank you Saul Alinsky. Now, it'll be tough for this to catch on, and a lot of these smart ideas never seem to crack into the MSM and die a quick death on the conservative media ghetto, but hopefully it'll get some traction. As a complete aside, there do seem to be a few people who will do original reporting and break things from the low-level to the larger media markets, people like Michelle Malkin, O'Reilly and a few others.
Labels: Dodd, freedomworks, marketing, messaging, movement
Obama's Abortions and Pro-Life Impotence
This article on LifeNews shows that the Obama Presidency will be a dark one indeed,
with an almost immediate repeal of all the laws and regulations pro-lifers have worked so hard to pass in what's become known as the 'incrementalist' strategy in a post-
Casey environment. If this happens, the pro-life camp will place blame in two main directions. The first group, the National Right to Life crowd (whom I affectionately like to call "National Right to Lose" for the political and campaign acumen), will say that the pro-life absolutists split the pro-life vote, confused pro-life voters and made the perfect the enemy of the good. The other crowd will point right back at the other, this crowd led predominantly by American Life League (which to be fair to NRLC, you could call "National Right to Not Know What You're Doing") and say that all those years permitting abortions and not agitating for an outright ban caused this massive defeat in the first place. It's an interesting, and ultimately, tautological proposition-- we'll never know the answer either way. However the NRLC crowd needs to be less arrogant, and the ALL crowd needs to be more accomodating, and if they work together maybe they could actually win some battles, some Senate races, or some things that matter. There are many things one can say about the pro-life movement, but political solvency is never one of them. And having met a few campaign hacks, I've never met one that respected or feared the pro-life vote or movement. That's gotta change if we're ever going to get serious about saving babies. This thinking was part of the plan I wrote for Students for Life of America to expand the movement of college pro-lifers through a field program and serious office, which they've done quite well with after I left. But theirs is a small, but critical, part of a countermovement that needs a radical transformation and renaissance. The major donors who finance pro-life activity feel tapped out, besieged, and frustrated by their previous gifts, but if Obama wins and the battles turn to the states-- a new degree of commitment will be needed from the young, from those at non-profits, and most especially from those who have the capacity to make the magic happen.
Meanwhile,
Satan over at the ACLU, oh I meant
Nadine Strossen whom I sometimes confuse for the dark lord, has been
raising $335 million to put into red states so that when Obama wins, the ACLU can continue its jihad against all things good. I barely need to mention that, as well, if Universal Healthcare brings about subsidized socialized abortions, we'll see a dramatic increase in the abortion rate. The pro-life movement is about to pay dearly for its relationship with Bush which gave them a great deal of access but a complete lack of results, and its decision to keep using the same political tactics.
Labels: ACLU, ALL, movement, Nadine Strossen, NRLC, obama, pro-life
