How does a de-centralized locally controlled movement get funded?

by: wegerje

Wed May 02, 2007 at 13:22:43 PM CDT


How does a de-centralized locally controlled movement get funded? That in a nutshell is our problem. It is a huge problem in the face of professional political consultants being part of a multi-billion dollar "industry." Right now it's Obama that is the focus of the question because of a dust-up between his centralized organizational model banging into the de-centralized volunteer work of an Obama fan. The thing about it is that it was a lot of work that yielded some impressive results for Obama.

But we don't have to look nationally for examples of the question. Lets consider the Joe Moore campaign for alderman. How important were the volunteer de-centralized grassroot and netroot efforts at keeping him in office versus the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent elsewhere. The numbers I saw briefly, and don't have the link handy now, were that Joe collected some $500,000 dollars in a year. He was third or fourth behind Emil Jones and Burt Natarus.

So how much of that money went to fostering the work of the DFA's and the IVI-IPOs and the BlogPACs of the grassroot and netroot worlds? Of that half million not even $30 went into an ad here at PSB. Which is fine, we don't need the money, but we could have put it to good use elsewhere. Even as an investment in the future of open politics it would have made sense.

It's past time that we figured out how to channel more of those billions of dollars through de-centralized locally controlled progressive movement organizations and efforts.
wegerje :: How does a de-centralized locally controlled movement get funded?
Tags: (All Tags)
Print Friendly View Send As Email
How does a de-centralized locally controlled movement get funded? | 29 comments
DFA Edgewater Rogers Park (0.00 / 0)
Did a lot of work for Joe Moore, but is not set up to receive donations. At this point, money management is not something we're interested in spending a lot of time working on.  I have no idea if Moore has donated to national DFA in Burlington, which is a PAC and solicits donations ...
I'm not feeling it (0.00 / 0)
What is the point of this diary?

Should grassroots supporters and organizations be looking for $$ from candidates? Maybe candidates should collaborate with DFAs to expand the grassroots base. Maybe candidates can partner with DFAs and other organizations to train folks in the methodology and techniques of political campaigns. Maybe the candidates and grassroots organizations can actually talk about what comes next....

But to pass along dollars? Please.

You're getting the point exactly. (0.00 / 0)
Your question/suggestions are exactly the ones that speak to the issue of how to bring volunteer efforts into the realms of supported efforts. Support can happen in a lot of ways and there needs to be clear avenues of access for those with the time, ability and interest.

Jeff Wegerson
[ Parent ]
I'm Still Not Gettiong Your Point (0.00 / 0)
From the DFA point of view, your original suggestion of money was totally, TOTALLY off base. As someone heavily involved with the Oak Park group I find it almost insulting, although I presume you were simply clueless.

Now you say, "Support can happen in a lot of ways." True. But beyond an open and unequivocal acknowledgement of the value of our support and a willingness to address our meetings as appropriate, it's not obvious what sort of support we need or could use. Certainly training isn't where it's at. I went to the DFA Training Academy in Warrenville last year, and it was excellent. For anyone who missed that one and hasn't gotten something equivalent (Camp Wellstone, for example) I would strongly recommend the Training Academy coming up in Springfield toward the end of September http://www.dfalink.c...

So, in practical, concrete terms -- and remembering that I don't know from Joe Moore (and neither do a lot of DFA members around the state) -- just what are you getting at?

Bill Thomasson

Permission to reprint explicitly granted

[ Parent ]
Not happy with Obama on this one (0.00 / 0)
The way the Obama campaign handled this turns me off completely. The guy started in a volunteer role and through his success wound up in an unpaid highly important position for the Obama campaign. Argue all you want whether he inteded this or not, he started volunteering and was so successfull he was working full time. And his work was pulling in media and dollars for the Obama campaign.

Any other campaign would have paid dearly to have a "professional" consultant be so successful. But when asked for a price for his efforts, they deemed paying a "volunteer" anything more than donut money was an affront and gave him a hearty "fuck you."

That speaks volumes, folks.

Think what you like about the price he named, but realize unless you hire consultants or are an avid reader of FEC reports, the figure named by Anthony was pretty darn good. For around .25 cents on the dollar per name he delivered big. Fundraising consultants go for $5-15K a month. Media people even more. I don't care if he started out as a volunteer, he delivered on the level of any high end consultant no matter what the candidate's last name.

I agree with Bowers on this one: I'm tired of the "grassroots" not getting paid for what they do when they go above and beyond. You want people with skills to help you for free, then we will keep getting beat as the GOP understands that people with skills have mortgages and kids braces to pay for.

Obama's campaign blew this one for me completely. Disclaimer: I've done paid consulting work for Senator Obama, and other candidates locally and nationally. I've also done plenty of volunteer work and pro-bono work as well. I understand how volunteers with skills can get into gray areas real quick. IMO an overworked volunteer found himself in a position he didn't intend and felt pushed out and bullied. Then was forcably removed. This speaks volumes to me.

wrong topic? (0.00 / 0)
it should speak volumes.  it should tell you that the obama campaign is just getting it together.  they seem to have just noticed that THIS IS A PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN.  oh, and they were letting some guy they didn't know control their message and be a point of contact for volunteers.  that's amateurish.  that's pitiful.  this isn't the dean campaign, whose message "you have the power" lent itself to such things.

let's just put this down as more evidence that democrats don't really want to win (unless it's convenient) and would rather play "let's build community" than attract and massage voters.  it joins a long list...

"We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it." - President Obama, Sept 9, 2009

[ Parent ]
Consider re-phrasing (0.00 / 0)
the "democrats don't really want to win..." to "too many democrats don't know how to win..."

Seriously, how many of these staffers and volunteers have been  trained and then been able to put the training into practice...successfully? Betcha not too many. So, they can be serious and win-at-all-costs kind of guys (and most of these folks are males, which is a whole 'nother story) and not know HOW to do this step-by-step.

And, given this, it changes the look at this situation and the remedies to this situation...beyond a list-making exercise.

[ Parent ]
no, it's a frustration i feel too often... (0.00 / 0)
it seems that it's more important for (some vocal/many/most?) democrats to make friends than to win elections.  winning is nice (if it falls in your lap), but let's not put too much effort into it (or something like that)...

"We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it." - President Obama, Sept 9, 2009
[ Parent ]
too many voices; not enough time (0.00 / 0)
You may be listening to the wrong voices...

Well, it may be your frustration but the reality of how to accomplish a win may not be internalized by a lot of folks. Or, the systems and how to apply the systems to actual conditions may be out of the reach of the voices that you're hearing. So, to some, an election is almost like buying a Lotto ticket: you have to play to win.

And, I would suppose that you're arguing for more than playing!

[ Parent ]
Voices (0.00 / 0)
Many of the voices you hear on blogs and e-lists come from people who don't understand how to win. They often give the impression that they don't want to understand how do win. But that reflects their frustration with what they have been told for 20 years is the winning strategy: "Run to the center." What they understand is issues and what they've heard about winning strategy is issues-related -- never mind that this purported "winning strategy hasn't been particularly successful.

The point about winning campaign organization simply hasn't penetrated. Maybe it never will; it doesn't mesh with what they're truly interested in. But many of these people are perhaps better viewed as pundits than as political activists. And the pundit class isn't where you should be looking for information about what's going on on the ground.

Bill Thomasson

Permission to reprint explicitly granted

[ Parent ]
running to the center made more sense... (4.00 / 1)
during nixon's time.  but for a host of reasons now we see this huge partisan divide.  with hillary, especially, we are beginning to see the exact same benchmark (46%-47%, pick 'em) that we saw 18 months before november 2004.  it's not that the center doesn't exist, just that people in the center are not necessarily trying to straddle this partisan divide.  i think the internet is part of the reason this circumstance exists, although i think other factors are involved, as well.

but *this* expression of frustration stems from 1.) the circular firing squad mentality we see about obama and this myspace thing, 2.) seemingly total neglect of the message (get the hell out of iraq) that i think we should be focused on right now, especially after this:

http://www.washingto...

and 3.) utter lack of message discipline among democrats and progressives.  but that's just me...

"We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it." - President Obama, Sept 9, 2009

[ Parent ]
How Important Is What I Say Here? (0.00 / 0)
You're right that the lack of message discipline is a function of the Internet. Which is to say, of tens if not hundreds of thousands of people posting political comments. You simply can't expect message discipline out of that hodge-podge. But with such a clamor of voices, does it really matter?

And the circular firing squad can be depressing. (Although we should remember that it is probably even more typical of the Illinois Republican party than of Democrats.) But at the same time, it's almost inevitable: Pundits simply have to have something to write about. Even purely amature pundits. Not to mention the imperatives of the primary system. It's simply something we have to live with, I think.

I didn't understand the relevance of your link to the French presidential debate to what you said about the war being the primary message. It did fit with what you said about the center. These are candidates from the left and right both trying to appeal to the swing vote in the center. And if the article is any indication (and I think it is), the center is much more interested in the candidate's personal qualities than in the issues.

Bill Thomasson

Permission to reprint explicitly granted

[ Parent ]
opps, wrong link! (0.00 / 0)

try this one:

http://www.armedforc...

that's what happens when i don't wait for a bookmark to load!  but my malaise (frustration) right now is not a function of what you or anyone here says.  i got to stop listening to the news right now!

"We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it." - President Obama, Sept 9, 2009

[ Parent ]
agreed (0.00 / 0)
I'm really kind of shocked that they didn't immediately buy him out or hire someone fulltime to start a profile of their own when his volunteer site took off. Seems like they were dancing with the devil in trying to capitolize on what he had done rather than start over with adequate control. Seems short sighted, especially now in retrospect. But that's hindsight.

Letting a volunteer be quasi in charge of your message in such a high visibility position is dangerous. If they would have offered to buy him out early, quickly, respectfully and quietly I doubt this would have happend. But as you point out, it looks like they were behind the curve on this one. But in their defense, this is still all new territory and they probably didn't see the impact such a volunteer site would have, nor the PR it would generate. After all, it is MySpace - not really the nexus for political discussion.

Also I feel your same frustration about wanting to win. Republicans would have paid the guy double and gave him a trip to Disneyland. But I don't think this was a "let's build community" thing at work here. I think it was just a lack of understanding of just how big an impact this guy was able to have, and just how little control they had over the aspects of the campaign's message that he controlled on that profile. Again, being a new dynamic, the potential to actually use the list generated on MySpace was probably not understood fully. I bet it still is probably not fully understood. I still find it hard to take anything on MySpace seriously.

In hindsight it was a clear hand off of the campaign's message to a third party. But in real time as it developed I'm not sure it wasn't viewed as just a PR generator that developed into a message liability over time.

[ Parent ]
my difficulty with this whole thing... (0.00 / 0)
is that myspace threw a wrench into this arrangement.  going from 40,000 friends (which came in slowly, and, i suspect, manageably) to 100,000 in a very short time had to be a shock to both joe and the campaign.  this is where the obama campaign clearly fscked up.  their deliberate consideration of this issue was no longer appropriate.  this was the point they needed to make a decision.  they didn't.

this, btw, is my major critique of obama himself.  he allows his staff to get paralyzed in thinking through all the angles.  he is a deliberate thinker himself.  but somebody there has to be willing to make a decision, at the right time, and accept the consequences if it's a bad decision.  that's what a presidential campaign requires...

"We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it." - President Obama, Sept 9, 2009

[ Parent ]
I Understand Where You're Coming From (0.00 / 0)
You've done both volunteer work and paid consulting and find it natural to move smoothly from one status to the other. But remember that there are other people, such as yours truly, who are quite jealous of their volunteer status and might be seriously turned off by an offer of payment. So please be careful of how you frame your statement when you say you're tired of the grassroots not being paid for their efforts.

Bill Thomasson

Permission to reprint explicitly granted
[ Parent ]
You better understand (0.00 / 0)
We've had this conversation enough times! ;-)

My comments on this are in regard to the sentiment voiced elsewhere regarding this guy as greedy or his service provided not being worth as much a the professional consultants whom he outperformed purely because he was a "volunteer."

Essentially as I see it (from reading both sides and probably projecting a bit) the guy started out doing a volunteer service with the associated volunteer level of stress and committment. The site grew and became more successful than he anticipated. The campaign "adopted" his volunteer effort as a quasi "official" part of the campaign. Feeling excitement, a sense of purpose and a healthy does of obligation not to let the campaign down, the guy presses onward. This raised the stress level, committement level, and associated pressures. His hours grow. The campaign demands grow beyond that of what is acceptable at a volunteer level, especially one with a full time job. At this point the volunteer effort morphed into something of a professional consulting position creating something with value beyond what any in-kind contribution could cover. The campaign looked to do CYA activity here, and regain obvious control required over their message. What ever happened between the campaign and the former volunteer now turned unpaid staffer created some tension that should have been avoided much earlier. And next thing we know people are talking about how the guy is greedy and charging way too much for his work, even though it is in line with what "professionals" charge to be half that successful.

My point was that if the campagin would have seen the guy as providing a valuable service and treated him with the same respect they treat a high paid consultant, this whole situation would have not happened IMO. Instead they chose to treat him as one lone volunteer they could steam roll either intentionally or through justified panic over the potential lack of message control the situation presented.

[ Parent ]
Basically Agree (0.00 / 0)
As I said on the other thread, I think the campaign needed to take full control and responsibility from the beginning. That's what you're saying, too. The idea that they could somehow have a site that was simultaneously official and unofficial was a nonstarter at several levels. Anthony could still have been involved. But because the site wouldn't have ultimately been his responsibility, it it got to be too much he could have cut back or dropped out without anyone feeling he was letting the campaign down.

I don't really focus on the money. In fact, I'm not sure it's ever been anything but a smokescreen. I may be wrong, but my feeling is that two people under stress blew up at each other (I've done that) and ended up rather publically burning their bridges.

Bill Thomasson

Permission to reprint explicitly granted

[ Parent ]
Its simple (0.00 / 0)
I never contribute to a national organization.  I send my dollars directly to the candidate.
candidates invest in infrastructure (0.00 / 0)
even less than the national organizations.
[ Parent ]
i'm pretty sure joe is aware of that... (0.00 / 0)
given his last outing...

"We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it." - President Obama, Sept 9, 2009
[ Parent ]
Joe Moore campaign fundraising 1/06-2/07 (0.00 / 0)
> Joe Moore campaign for alderman ... collected some $500,000 dollars in a year

Here are some links to some notes on Moore's campaign fundraising in the 14 months from 1/1/06 through the Feb primary:

Whose Alderman Is He?

Joe Moore By the Numbers: Rogers Park Edition

Joe Moore: America's Alderman

Joe Moore By The Numbers: All in a Day's Work

Some key points:

* Moore raised an astonishing $683,515.28 between January 1, 2006 and the primary, more than 6 YEARS of the salary of the job he sought.

* More than 82%, over half a million dollars, came from OUTSIDE zip code 60626, the main zip code for the 49th ward.

* Moore raised $4.63 OUTSIDE 60626 for every dollar he raised INSIDE 60626.

* 78%, more than three quarters, of the support for Joe Moore, more than a half a million dollars, came from OUTSIDE the Greater Rogers Park Area (defined as 60645 + '26 + '60).

* Moore raised more than $3.50 from non-constituents for every dollar he raised from constituents.

* More than one fourth of Moore's support, $180,000 is not even from Chicago.

* Moore raised more money OUTSIDE Chicago than all his challengers raised, combined, from ALL sources.

* Moore's political campaign raised an amazing average of $1,612.06 per day.

* Every day, Moore raised an average of more than 5 times as much for his political campaign as he earned on his day job, nominally working for his constituents, the residents of the 49th Ward.

This is what I'm talking about yinn... (0.00 / 0)
the highjacking of on-topic posts to rant about the poster's troll-like issues.  And the originals were all front page.
[ Parent ]
Laundering special interest money into grassroots support (0.00 / 1)
> So how much of that money went to fostering the work of the DFA's and the IVI-IPOs and the BlogPACs of the grassroot and netroot worlds?

So a politician can purchase grassroots support by taking special interest, out-of-district money and awarding it to "local" groups?

And with this post you're announcing you're available to help?

This Is Libel! (0.00 / 0)
Given that at this point you know from reading previous comments that local DFA groups not only do not, but CANNOT accept money -- they simply have no structure for handling money from any source -- this allegation that they could be bought is not only false but is made with reckless disregard of the truth. That's LIBEL, my friend. DFA groups' lack of formal structure may keep them from dragging your sorry rear into court, but I wouldn't count on that continuing if you keep telling any lie that comes into your head.

Bill Thomasson

Permission to reprint explicitly granted
[ Parent ]
Problem? What problem? (0.00 / 1)
> How does a de-centralized locally controlled movement get funded? That in a nutshell is our problem. It is a huge problem...

Our problem? Whose problem? What's the problem exactly?

> Which is fine, we don't need the money ...

Nice finesse! A "Where's Mine?" whine complete with a weaselly out.

> ... we could have put it to good use elsewhere.

Where? So if Moore had wrote you a nice phat one, what would you have done with it?

Problem or No Problem (0.00 / 0)
> It is a huge problem

> Which is fine, we don't need the money

so...

which is it?

Wait til you see the expenditures! (0.00 / 0)
> ... the Joe Moore campaign for alderman ... collected some $500,000 dollars ...

> So how much of that money went to fostering the work of the DFA's and the IVI-IPOs and the BlogPACs of the grassroot and netroot worlds?

If you are offended by the amount of dough Moore reported that he RAISED and you didn't get your taste, be sure and save some umbrage for when Moore reports his EXPENDITURES in July, and you see just who got paid and you didn't.

You'll REALLY be annoyed when he reports funneling money to the local ACORN franchise to print racist fliers and hire black high school drop-outs from the south side to stand on the 49th ward EL platforms and pass them out.

And you'll REALLY be pissed when you see how he paid to print and mail racist postcards with a return address faked to appear to originate from a challenger's supporter.

Moore & PSB (0.00 / 0)
> ... the Joe Moore campaign for alderman ... collected some $500,000 dollars

> Of that half million not even $30 went into an ad here at PSB.

Did Moore buy a $29.95 "ad" on PSB?

How does a de-centralized locally controlled movement get funded? | 29 comments
Prairie State Blue
Front Page - Back Page


Menu

Make a New Account

Username:

Password:



Forget your username or password?

0 User(s) logged on.
Search




Advanced Search

Misc
View
Powered by: SoapBlox