David Macko <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said:
> The Libertarian Party should not have a National Convention in 2008! > Now that I have your attention, let me assure everybody who is reading this > message that I am not a neocon saboteur hellbent on destroying the > Libertarian Party. > I recommend that we hold our National Convention to nominate a > presidential candidate > for 2008 in 2007. > This was our practice from 1976 until 1996. The arguments for the > change seemed plausible at the > time, including more publicity in an election year. Actually the main argument in favor was to give us legal standing to sue for ballot-access relief in states where the early petitioning deadlines plus no substitution made for a discriminatory situation. The logic was that if the Dems and Reps can pick a couple of months before the elections, we should be able to do the same until roughly the same time. We got the law changed in Virginia partially due to the lawsuit threat from our "year-of-election" convention in 1996. There may still be a couple of states where continued action of that sort is needed; I don't know. > Nominating our candidates a year before the convention would give them > more time to campaign > with unified party support. It would make petitioning easier in many > states with more time and > less expense for paid petitioners where necessary since there is less > competition in odd-numbered years. We used to petition early in almost all states where it was legal. We could now, but our early petitioning efforts have been scaled way back. Unfortunately, we are our own worst enemy on ballot access. In 2004, the two biggest obstacles to getting petitioning work done early were 1) a species of LNCers who actively sabotaged presidential ballot access work in 2004 (and who make no bones about doing it again in the future) -- and 2) a National Director who refused to allow the ballot access committee to even **ASK** LP members to fund a presidential ballot drive (until it was almost too late). I doubt anyone will want the thankless task of coordinating any 2008 ballot drive at all, because success or hard work in this area will be met not with accolades or gratitude, but rather with blistering criticism and obstruction. > Now is the time to promote this return to our original practice through > all available media, including LP News. I could live with an earlier selection unless there are any compelling lawsuits over early deadlines or candidate substitutions that still need to be fought; however, I would prefer that it be earlier in the Pres year rather than the summer of the previous year. But in any case, if we re-elect the LNC members who have obstructed our ballot access efforts -- in order to push through their vision of not running a presidential campaign at all -- it's pointless to worry about the *timing* of the national convention. -- Marc ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> 1.2 million kids a year are victims of human trafficking. Stop slavery. http://us.click.yahoo.com/U6CDDD/izNLAA/cUmLAA/KlSolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> ForumWebSiteAt http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
