2014 Political Campaigns/Politics Thread: Even number years = $$$

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > 2014 Political Campaigns/Politics Thread: Even number years = $$$

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

I've had some interesting experiences volunteering to gather signatures. It's kind of neat because 90% of the people you talk to are already inclined to agree with you so it's mostly positive experiences.

I can almost guarantee that if you spend 3 hours gathering signatures, you'll have an interesting story or two. Liberals ARE kind of weird.

# ¿ Jun 17, 2014 10:13

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# ¿ May 9, 2024 21:55

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

GlyphGryph posted:

So, I never did find a place online that listed local candidates, but I followed the lawn signs until I found what seems to be a campaign office, and across the street hidden in a nook is another campaign office for a different guy (that did not have lawn signs), both of whom seem to be running for the same spot?

But both offices are always empty. There's no web address, no phone number, I can't find any way to volunteer for either of them online.

To be honest I did not expect this part of the process to be so difficult, I'm guessing most people who get into this do crazy stuff like "already knowing people that are involved somehow". Still, though! I think I'm almost there!

I've been thinking that a person with a moderate understanding of social media would be able to kick the crap out of a local election like this. With a simple website, facebook page and an email address you'd probably have a real shot.

# ¿ Jul 9, 2014 20:18

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

At the last Legislative District meeting there was a discussion of getting a website.
I'm the only IT person but I'm more helpdesk than web development.

That said, gently caress helpdesk, let's learn a new skill. Anyone have some resources on how to make a functional website that can allow one or two users to post announcements and a calendar?

Edit:
Playing around with WordPress. Any ideas on whether or not this will work?

Disabled comments and it actually looks decent.

Dr. Arbitrary fucked around with this message at 08:09 on Jul 13, 2014

# ¿ Jul 13, 2014 05:02

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

Ok, I've got a calendar and some basic stuff. Now, what's the most economical way to do this?

This is what I'm looking at now:

Domain name for $10 a year
DigitalOcean for $60 a year

Is that about right or am I going overboard?

# ¿ Jul 14, 2014 06:26

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

Jackson Taus posted:

That sounds fairly reasonable. Any cheaper on the hosting and you're in "tiny shared computer in some teenage nerd's mom's closet" territory I feel like. In addition to WordPress, you'll need to set-up a mail server and mailing lists.

You also need an ActBlue (or whatever the Republican equivalent is) site if you raise any money ever. It's DEFINITELY not worth trying to do this in-house unless (a) you're a web programming/admin Zen Master and (b) you're going to be raising poo poo-loads of money. Getting SSH certs costs money, dealing with the paperwork hurdles so you can accept credit cards, proper record keeping, an order of magnitude more security work, blah blah blah seriously just use Act Blue.

If you want, you could probably get MYDISTRICT.STATEDEMOCRATS.ORG for free (saving you $10 on a domain name) depending on how the tech guys at the state-level are. If you're running a campaign or something you need your own domain name, but if it's just the general webpage for a Legislative District party, you may not need your own domain name.

A private host for wordpress might have been overkill, but if I'm going to do Email, lists and donations then yeah, that would justify it.
Hopefully I don't gently caress this up because this'll be a nice thing to put on my Resume.

# ¿ Jul 14, 2014 09:13

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

I did some volunteer work yesterday. I signed up for a phone bank and when I showed up, all they had were a few cricket mobile phones because the guy who knew how to set up the real phones didn't show up or something.

I spent six hours making cable and wiring up a call center and I feel great. One of the phone bankers told me that she had contacted someone to volunteer and they said "I don't want to do a phone bank on those crappy little cell phones again. Call me when you get real phones" the phone banker replied "You're my first call on a real phone, they just put them in!" :3:

# ¿ Jul 16, 2014 22:05

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

Aquila posted:

I'd like to recommend the company I work at, NationBuilder, for all your campaign website, people database, social media, email, and community organizing needs. I think we have a really strong product and would be happy to answer some questions about it, though I'm not in sales so if you're interested you should just hit up our sales line.

If my Legislative district was swimming in cash, I'd consider it, but I'm basically paying for this out of my own pocket so I want to use it to get some job experience.

I think you have a pretty awesome product. I'd definitely recommend it to larger organizations and campaigns.
Here's a local politician who's using your site, I think it looks great: http://www.aaronmarquez.com/

# ¿ Jul 22, 2014 22:16

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

I had an interesting and fun volunteer experience the other day. I drove a candidate around a neighborhood while he knocked on doors. I didn't have to talk to anyone, just google addresses and let the candidate know the name, sex and party of the person he's visiting.

Easiest volunteer day ever.

# ¿ Sep 22, 2014 18:13

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

JohnSherman posted:

This question is ridiculously old, but I'm gonna answer it anyway. I did some volunteering during the last Presidential election, both for Obama and for a candidate running for US Representative, since the campaigns shared an office. One of the things we were told to do while canvassing was to offer to collect absentee ballots and get them delivered. From what I saw, this seemed to be fairly effective, as a lot of people had forgotten about their ballots entirely, and would fill them out while I waited. I helped with this for a few days, until one night an FO for our opponent managed to snag an interview with one of the local news stations. During the interview, he warned people about unscrupulous individuals posing as election officials trying to collect their absentee ballots, and that they should call the police if someone was attempting this in their neighborhood. Technically, what he said was true. Election officials are not going to come by to pick up ballots, but it is completely legal for campaign workers to do so. The news station thought this was a helpful bit of non-partisan advice, and repeated it every time election coverage came up. The local newspaper had a short article about it as well. All of a sudden, people were telling us to gently caress off, and the cops did show up and hassle a few volunteers while they were out canvassing. When we tried to contact the news about it, they were reluctant to correct themselves, as they felt it would muddle the message. After a couple days, our FO just said "gently caress it" and told us to avoid bringing up ballots entirely.

Our candidate ended up losing.

In my area, there have been groups going around collecting ballots to deliver. I guess the new dirty trick is to try and convince everyone that it's actually voter fraud.

http://www.arizonadailyindependent.com/2014/10/16/arizona-primary-ballot-box-stuffing-caught-on-tape/

# ¿ Oct 23, 2014 19:52

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

Anyone ever do voter protection on election day before? I'm going to be doing it for the first time this election and I'm starting to get nervous.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 09:34

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

I've got a new project to get done in the next two years.

I'm going to design a setup that includes a tablet PC and a small printer (like a high resolution receipt printer) to allow a volunteer to hang out near polling stations and help people print out bills to prove their address.

The smaller the better!

# ¿ Nov 5, 2014 01:00

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

What do you guys think of this analysis:

http://georgelakoff.com/2014/11/13/democratic-strategies-lost-big-heres-why-and-how-to-fix-it/

quote:

Democratic Strategies Lost Big. Here�s Why and How to Fix It.
November 13, 2014
By George Lakoff
It is time to shine a light on the perpetually losing strategies used by Democrats, and particularly on the Democratic infrastructure that promotes those strategies.

I am asking whether the old strategies can be separated from the community of strategists, so that new strategies can be adopted by that community that are authentic, moral, and fully general.

The strategists form an infrastructure that all Democrats have come to depend on�candidates, elected officials, Democrats in government, and citizens who align, or might align, either morally or practically with progressive policies. This well-funded, and well-connected strategic infrastructure includes public relations firms, pollsters, consultants, researchers, trainers, communication specialists, speechwriters, and their funders.

Democrats depend on this expensive infrastructure. The strategists seem to assume that their strategies are natural and obvious, the best that can be done. It is time to look closely at these strategies and question them. The same mistakes, if they are mistakes, should not be repeated.

You probably noticed some of these strategies during the 2014 election:

� Direct your strategy to the election, rather than to changing how Americans understand what Democrats are and to changing day-to-day political discourse. In reality, it is the day-to-day discourse changes that most affect elections and move our politics over time.

� Use demographic categories to segment the electorate, categories from the census (race, gender, ethnicity, age, marital status, income, zip code), as well as publicly available party registration. This does not include segmentation for conservative and progressive moral worldviews, which can be done with the right questions..

� Assume uniformity across the demographic categories. Poll on which issues are �most important,� e.g., for women (or single women), for each minority group, for young people, and so on. This separates the issues from one another and creates �issue silos.� In reality, issues are systemically related via moral worldviews.

� Assume language is neutral and that the same poll questions will have the same meaning for everyone polled. In reality, language is defined relative to conceptual frames. And the same words can be �contested,� that is, they can have opposite meanings depending on one�s moral values.

� Assume that people vote on the basis of material self-interest. Design different messages to appeal to different demographic groups. In reality, poor conservatives, as well as rich liberals, will vote against their material interests when they identify with a candidate and his or her values. Values trump issues.

� In polling, apply statistical methods to the answers given in each demographic group. This will impose a �bell curve� in the results. The bell curve will impose a �middle� in each case. The middle may well be illusory, given the wide separation in worldviews. This is shown in biconceptualism research.

� Assume that most voters are in the middle imposed by the bell curve. Suggest that candidates and elected officials move to the middle. If their beliefs are on the left of the �middle,� they should still move to the right to be where the bell curve claims that most voters are. This will be helping conservatives, by supporting their beliefs. And your candidate may be saying things Democrats don�t believe. Your candidate will become Republican-lite. Voters at least some conservative values will go for real Republicans, not Repiblicans-lite.

� Check the polls to see how popular the present Democratic president is; if he is not popular, design your message to dissociate your candidate from the president. This will reinforce the unpopularity of the president. When members of his own party disown him, voters will come to think he should be disowned and so should the party he leads.

� Attack your opponents as being �extremists� when they hold views typical of the far right. If voters happen to share any of those views, you will be attacking those voters as extremists, even if that are partly progressive. Your opponents will be seen as courageous, standing up for what they believe. You will be helping your opponents.

� Attack your candidate�s opponent for getting money from rich corporations or individuals. This will help your opponent among Republicans (and some Democrats) who respect the values of the wealthy and successful.

� Argue against your opponents by quoting them, using their language and negating that language. In reality, negating a frame reinforces the frame, as in the sentence �Don�t think of an elephant!� This practice will mostly reinforce the views of your opponent.

Such strategies miss the opportunity to present an overriding moral stand that fits the individual issues, while saying clearly what ideals Democrats stand for as Democrats. There happens to be such an overriding ideal that most Democrats authentically believe in.

Why is this important?

First: Because all politics is moral. Voters vote for what they see as right. Conservatives and progressives have almost opposite ideas as to what is right. In candidates, voters look for people who have what they see as the right character, people who will do, and stand up for, what they see as right.

Second: Progressive and conservatives have very different understandings of democracy. For progressives empathy is at the center of the very idea of democracy. Democracy is a governing system in which citizens care about their fellow citizens and work through their government to provide public resources for all. In short, in a democracy, the private depends on the public.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) says it out loud. If you have a business it depends on public resources: roads, bridges, the Interstate highway system, sewers, a water supply, airports and air traffic control, the Federal Reserve, a patent office, public education for your employees, public health, the electric grid, the satellite communications, the Internet, and more. You can�t run a business without these. Say it out loud: The private depends on the public.

The same holds true of individuals, who depend on public resources like clean air, clean water, safe food and products, public safety, access to education and health care, housing, employment � as well as everything listed above.

These public resources provide necessary freedoms. In fact, most progressive issues are freedom issues, such as:

� Voting: Without the ability to vote in free elections, you are not free.

� Health: If you get sick and don�t have health care, you are not free.

� Education: Without education, you lack the knowledge and skills to earn a decent living or be aware of the possibilities of life, and are therefore not free.

� Women: If you are denied control over your body, you are not free.

� Marriage: If you are in love and denied the ability to marry publicly, you are not free.

� Vast income inequality: When most economic gains go to the wealthiest of the wealthy, and not those who did the work, then most working people are not free.

� Race: When you are treated with suspicion and disdain, you are not free.

� Corporate Control: When corporations control your life for their benefit, you are not free.

� Global Warming: As the glaciers melt, the rivers go dry, the seas rise up, the fish die, and you are overwhelmed by drought, violent storms, floods, heat waves and freezes, you are not free.

And one more, which played a major role in the 2014 election:

� Fear: When you are emotionally gripped by whipped-up unreal fear, you are not free.

As President Franklin Delano Roosevelt pointed out, freedom from fear is a vital freedom. In the 2014 election, conservatives played on fear�of ISIS and Ebola.

Progressives instinctively know all this, but few say it. Instead, they follow the old strategies and talk issue-by-issue, interest group by interest group, about isolated facts, policies, and programs.

Imagine if Americans understood instinctively that Democrats stand for the most basic of freedoms, that those freedoms arise from public resources provided by citizens like themselves who care about their fellow Americans as well as themselves. In my experience, that is overwhelmingly true. Why not say it? Proudly. Over and over.

And why not train ordinary progressive citizens who want to be spokespeople to speak out in their communities. The conservatives have been doing this for decades, by throughout the US and in 15 other countries, with scary success. They need to be countered.

I've seen some of the strategies in the first half personally and watched them fail like crazy. Specifically: "Attack your opponents as being �extremists� when they hold views typical of the far right. If voters happen to share any of those views, you will be attacking those voters as extremists, even if that are partly progressive. Your opponents will be seen as courageous, standing up for what they believe. You will be helping your opponents."

I was canvassing for the first time with an experienced volunteer and while speaking with a veteran, she started going on about how the opposing candidate was a Tea Party gun nut. Probably scored a vote for the other team with that visit.

# ¿ Nov 14, 2014 02:10

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# ¿ May 9, 2024 21:55

Dr. Arbitrary: Mar 15, 2006; Bleak Gremlin

I've got a question for the more experienced Campaign people.

I've been volunteering with the party group for the State Legislative district I'm in. I've built a website for them and just recently set up MailChimp for a mailing list.

There aren't a lot of people on the list yet and we've only sent out one campaign. It hasn't been a week, and we're getting emails from local groups asking us to send out mail for this event and that.

My concern is that if we send out too much stuff, people will start to ignore it.

My thinking is that we should stick to once a month. We'll try to put good content in that email, all sorts of good events etc. I might create an opt-in list for "Please send me notices for everything!"
I'd like to make emails outside of that schedule for truly special news or events.
Has anyone else had to deal with this kind of thing, any advice?

# ¿ Mar 19, 2015 06:22

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > 2014 Political Campaigns/Politics Thread: Even number years = $$$