Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Same questions for whowillfightbigmoney.org

Whowillfightbigmoney.org, the recently formed coalition of ten leading reform groups. has an agenda of "asking every candidate for Congress to tell us where they stand on our 13-point Fighting Big Money agenda, the plan to restore balance to our democracy and put We The People back in charge."

This agenda, and the tactics and strategy being deployed by the new organization (see the organization's Who Will Fight Big Money and EmpowerEveryday People? toolkit), seem cut from the same cloth as the agenda, tactics and strategy Democracy Spring is currently pursuing (described in Democracy Spring's Forcing a Choice Toolkit).

It is unclear whether there is supposed to be an advantage in having two organizations rather than one organization.

Be that as it may, I have been trying to ask questions and make comments to Democracy Spring about how it is trying to advance its agenda. The same questions and comments, I believe, are legitimately directed to Whowillfightbigmoney.org as well.

A. Messaging that will connect with voters

The Who Will Fight Big Money and EmpowerEveryday People? toolkit says it will provide "neecssary" resources "to talk to a jaded public about the problem of our out-of-balance political system" and will provide "[m]essaging guidance, based on years of research from some of the country’s leading pollsters, on how to connect with voters on the issue;"

The content of messaging is very important, but I think even more important is getting the messaging as widely disseminated to the public as possible.

It is obvious that our messaging powers are pathetic, compared, for example, to what Donald Trump can do with a single tweet read by tens of thousands of voters, and that can get out to  hundreds of thousands of voters if his tweet is rebroadcast by TV news.. Bernie Sanders continues to get thousands of people hearing his messaging at rallies, and it too is rebroadcast by TV news. The Sanders campaign seems to have done widespread phone banking and a lot of door to door canvassing. Thousands of tweets show up on his hashtags every day. Similar goes for Trump.

Compared to the Trump and Sanders campaigns, our social media messaging has very limited reach, and we  don't have money to do TV advertising or even US mail mailings or phone banking.

For more than a year I have been urging ideas about how to expand our messaging capacities.

I have encountered incomprehensible unwillingness of reform organizations to give any consideration to the same (as best I can tell).

One idea I have been pushing is to try to do messaging which takes advantage of the immense attention paid to the Trump and Sanders candidacies and their grassroots underpinnings. My effort started last July (see Proposed messaging re: Congress), and evolved into "tweeting banks" connected to the Presidential election, such as this last one CALIFORNIA - Last tweeting bank for Sen. Sanders. With Sen. Sanders' chances fading, I have tried to persuade Sanders supporters to turn their attention to Congressional races. See Berniecrat Congressional candidates.

I have not been able to get any encouragement of reform organizations to these efforts to capture benefit for our cause through reaching out to Sanders supporters (and even to Trump supporters).

Also, I have argued that conventional social media messaging, such as being pursued by Democracy Spring, and now by Whowillfightbigmoney.org, has significant limitations but there is a way to break through the limitations. See Breaking out of like minded social media circles. I have not been able to get any reaction to this from MAYDAY, Democracy Spring, and other reform groups.

I hope Whowillfightbigmoney.org will give more thought to how poor our messaging capabilities are and will strive hard to find ways to expand our social media messaging reach.

B. When is there dead end partisan posturing?

Please read A question for DemSpring. The entry tries to inquire whether MAYDAY in 2015 merely advanced the cause of partisan posturing, and whether Democracy Spring is at risk of doing the same thing, with the result  that our issue is at serious risk of being just another one of numerous partisan gridlock matters that the American people despair of their broken Congress doing their job about, and, as such, disappears in the fog of the perpetual political war.

I have seen no answer from Democracy Spring to my question and don't know what their thinking about this is.

I believe Whowillfightbigmoney.org is at the same risk as Democracy Spring and ought to answer the question that Democracy Spring has yet to answer.

Please note that, if Whowillfightbigmoney.org is satisfied with its approach after considering the question, I think there are things the Democrats can be called on to do that will help negate partisan posturing and assist the Whowillfightbigmoney.org agenda.

C. The problem of politicians making promises

Both Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org are proceeding in the mode of seeking candidates in the 2016 elections to make promises of what they will do if elected, for those promises to influence outcomes in the elections, and for the elected candidates to fulfill their promises in the new Congress. 

Things can obviously go awry with this approach, including that not enough of the candidates making the promise win their elections, the ease with which elected candidates can wiggle out of their promises after they are elected, and it becoming necessary for voters to go through the exercise again in the the next election cycle if the new Congress does not pass satisfactory reform legislation.

It would behoove Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org  to search hard for ways to lessen or avoid the risks of what can go awry with the approach they have chosen.

This is what motivated my 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations approach. The approach seeks to force Congress to debate and act (or not act) before Nov. 8th. It does not ask a candidate to take any position about what should be done, but only demand that Congress face up and act (or not act). 

The circumstances give my approach some credibility. Consider the below statistical information that The Who Will Fight Big Money and EmpowerEveryday People? toolkit sets out
• Three-quarters of the American people believe their government is corrupt (Gallup, September 2015).
 • Four out of five Americans—including 80 percent of Republicans—oppose the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision (Bloomberg News, September 2015).
 • Eighty-four percent of Americans believe money has too much influence in politics (New York Times/CBS News, June 2015).
• Ahead of the presidential caucuses in Iowa, voters there—arguably some of the most engaged in the political process—are angry about money in politics. A full 93 percent of likely Democratic caucus-goers and 91 percent of Republicans said they were unsatisfied or “mad as hell” about the issue of money in politics. (Bloomberg News/Des Moines Register, August 2015).
 • Voters support efforts to reform the system. A full 85 percent of voters think we need fundamental changes or to completely rebuild the system. (New York Times/CBS News, June 2015).
 • Seventy-two percent of Americans support small-donor solutions, like matching funds, to overhaul our broken system (Every Voice, December 2015).
If that information is correct, it should make it hard for a candidate to be unwilling to demand that Congress address this before Nov. 8th, and any candidate who makes that demand should be viewed favorably and not adversely. Making such a demand should be a lot easier than making a pledge as requested by Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org.

Voters may be more inclined to participate in a tweeting bank in a Congressional district if they are not asked to tweet for a particular candidate, and instead are only asked to tweet that all the candidates demand that Congress debate and act (or not act) before Nov. 8th.

The approach of Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org also suffers from conundrum #2 of Zephyr Teachout's conundrums and the impediment to voter unity relative to our issue, when voters may consider other issues more important in making their voting decision.. My 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations approach goes a long way to solving that conundrum.

D. We are faced with a "heavy lift"

The introductory letter in the Whowillfightbigmoney.org  toolkit says:
Candidates will respond to a persistent and insistent call from constituents on social media, at town hall meetings, in letters, calls, and emails. This isn’t a heavy lift, but we need people in every district, so please join us and encourage others you know who are concerned about the future of our democracy to join us too. 
I disagree. My opinion is we are facing a very "heavy lift."

When he launched MAYDAY, Professor Lessig called it a "moonshot." Professor Lessig went from a "moonshot" at the Congressional level, to a "hail Mary" at the Presidential level. That "hail Mary" failed, and Professor Lessig did not return to MAYDAY for pursuing the "moonshot" at the Congressional level,

Democracy Spring's spent six months exclusively dedicated to planning the April civil disobedience action, which resulted in foregoing "outreach" during important early months in the Congressional elections. This can be interpreted that the "moonshot" at the Congressional level was going to be even more difficult than originally thought.

Most believe that Congress benefits from the status quo and is not going to pass satisfactory reform of its own accord, and the voters must force that on Congress. This calls for widespread grassroots mobilization.

The past two years have not demonstrated much grassroots mobilization. MAYDAY has been at work since July 2014 and has little to show. You can decide for yourself how much grassroots mobilization MAYDAY has stimulated by looking at their Facebook pages https://www.facebook.com/MAYDAYdotUS and  https://www.facebook.com/groups/MAYDAYPAC/); their Twitter https://twitter.com/MAYDAYUS, and their Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/maydaypac. I see virtually zero.

Compare MAYDAY with the Trump and Sanders campaigns and the huge amounts of grassroots mobilization they have simulated.

I would say our grassroots mobilization is less than one twentieth of what Trump and Sanders have stimulated.

All these things considered, I repeat my belief that it is going to be a very "heavy lift" for Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org to simulate meaningful grassroots mobilization, and it is going to be an even "heavier lift" for the grassroots to advance meaningfully the agendas of the two organizations.

E. Conclusion

Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org must find ways to do a better job of stimulating widespread grassroots activity than MAYDAY has done.

I don't know whether the dearth of grassroots mobilization that MAYDAY has arrived at after two years is because grassroots did not hear about MAYDAY, or because grassroots learned about MAYDAY but they were not very stimulated by MAYDAY and concluded that MAYDAY was not going to stimulate much so such grassroots decided not to bother with MAYDAY.

Either way Democracy Spring and Whowillfightbigmoney.org have their work cut out in moving their agendas forward.


EDIT 6/2/16
The below is a Facebook posting copied and pasted from MAYDAY.US. It illustrates how MAYDAY supporters spend their time in discussion among themselves, and give no attention to how to get messaging out to the public. This kind of internal discussion accomplishes almost nothing and distracts from making effort to spread awareness of the issue in the public domain. Beneficial, helpful messaging to the public can be done without there being agreement about how to solve the corruption problem, but that escapes the attention of those discussing and arguing among themselves.
Should we oppose Debbie Wasserman Schultz? Vote here!http://bit.ly/1Ze9GE6
As DNC chair she gave big money interests more power while making it harder for everyday Americans to be heard. And after taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from special interests, she sided with Wall Street against consumers.
Comments
Josh Green No, "primary"-ing Democrats is not the answer. When will Mayday put its money toward something useful, like a California initiative that represents real campaign finance reform and creates a legal challenge to Citizens United? This well-meaning, but dead-in-the-water strategy of electing a majority of MOCs who are pro-reform is equivalent to asking a group of oil executives to embrace climate change action.
Rick Oliver Millward No, citizens united and corporate personhood should be reversed!
JoAnn Baker Paul Isn't getting DWS out of obstruction part of that strategy?#JoshGreen: #Represent.Us
Bob Bergeson Absolutely!
David Cameo Jeepers, yes. Good morning!

Monday, May 30, 2016

whowillfightbigmoney.org and tweeting banks

Common Cause has assembled "a coalition of leading democracy reform groups who recognize the need for immediate action to restore democracy, [and which] stand united supporting commonsense protections that recognize the people as the ultimate check on the corrosive influence of money in politics, which is eroding the very foundation of self-government." http://www.whowillfightbigmoney.org/partners

The groups in the coalition are:






The homepage is http://www.whowillfightbigmoney.org/

There is a companion 31 page citizen-activist briefing book and toolkit on money in politics and how to get candidates on the record supporting reform: Who Will Fight Big Money and EmpowerEveryday People?.

The contact email address that is given is  FightBigMoney@commoncause.org.

I have sent the below email to whowillfightbigmoney.org, asking what they think about tweeting banks:
From: Rob Shattuck <rdshattuck@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, May 29, 2016 at 1:21 PM
Subject: Tweeting bank tool
To: FightBigMoney@commoncause.org
Dear whowillfightbigmoney.org,
Would you kindly provide me with your opinion about this tweeting bank tool I have been trying to develop and push: http://2016candidatesdeclarations.blogspot.com/2016/02/template-for-congressional-districts.html
For a specific example of the tool, see FL23 tweeting bank.
Do you think the tool is a good tool? A useless tool? A counterproductive tool?
Would you encourage people to participate and tweet in tweeting banks, if they are inclined to do so?
Thank you for considering this.

Saturday, May 28, 2016

Getting going faster rather than slower

The below "Outreach" is copied and pasted from Democracy Spring's Forcing a Choice Toolkit.
Outreach
It’s time to get started with outreach. You can do it! It’s simple and anyone can participate. The first step is to choose which politicians or candidates you'd like to focus your energy on. Start with one or two and go from there.
Here are a few things to consider when deciding who to focus your outreach efforts on:
Signers that are setting the narrative in their respective races will bring the most leverage to our effort. So try to focus on candidates that are reaching at least 30 percent in the polls.We also want to reach out to candidates/incumbents in any and all competitive races, and races with high profile candidates, as this is where the broader electoral story is being told.Potential allies and obvious opponents are good first targets, because they embody the choice we want all candidates and officeholders to make. If you reach out to an incumbent, you should reach out to their competitive challengers as well and vise versa, regardless of their party affiliation.Focus on candidates/incumbents that are representing your district or state, others are unlikely to pay much attention to your efforts.
Find Incumbents:US House of RepresentativesUS SenateState Legislatures  Everyone else

The Toolkit says there are to be weekly EVFA discussions on Thursdays at 8:30 pm on Slack. I don't know if there was one this past Thursday.

A. Faster rather than slower

While it is understood that Democracy Spring had to dedicate all of its resources to planning the April civil disobedience action, the six or so months before April were also an important early time in the 2016 Congressional elections.

However understandable it is, Democracy Spring starting the above "Outreach" now is slow off the mark.

This calls for getting "Outreach" going all the more faster rather than slower now.

Prompt reporting by people of what they are doing, and easy modes of communication about the same, will contribute to speeding things up.

I am not familiar with Slack, but I will seek to participate there.

I have been reporting and communicating for months by means of this blog and tweets, and people may communicate back by means of comments on entries, email, and the google group I have set up.

B. Going outside of one's State or district

The last point in the above "Outreach" says, "Focus on candidates/incumbents that are representing your district or state, others are unlikely to pay much attention to your efforts."

I disagree with that and think my tweeting bank concept (see, e.g. FL23 tweeting bank) should be tried out as a way for people outside a State or Congressional district to lend a hand for "outreach" in the State or Congressional district.

It seems particularly beneficial for people to be able to contribute to "outreach" outside their own State or district, given the "Outreach" targeting guidelines, such as for targeting competitive districts.

"Outreach" can be speeded up if people can be given a choice to plunge in where there is already meaningful "outreach" going on and they can sense their help making a difference, such as in a competitive race.

Democracy Spring should think more about how people can contribute to "outreach" outside their own State or district.

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Taking the next step

The object of this entry is to persuade FightBigMoney warriors to go beyond retweets and likes of tweets, and to send tweets to candidates and to other voters, as set out in Tactics.

Spending time on tweeting in this #DeclareForDemocracy citizen effort should be evaluated in comparison to other modes of FightingBigMoney in the coming months.

Democracy Spring is currently the lead organization pushing to FightBigMoney at the Congressional level. (Its website says "Democracy Spring has thus far been organized by a coalition of over 120 organizations, including a steering committee made up of 99Rise, Avaaz, Democracy Matters, Energy Action Coalition, MAYDAY.US, the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union (RWDSU), and the United States Student Association (USSA).")

Democracy Spring's April civil disobedience action targeted Congress and sought to force "immediate action to end the corruption of big money in politics."

Now Democracy Spring is transitioning to this:
From here, we need to take the fight home to states across the union, challenging candidates and elected officials to take a side, lifting up those who declare their support for fundamental reforms to fix our democracy, and exposing those who refuse to do so as defenders of the corrupt status quo. We will disrupt their fundraisers, their debates, their press conferences, and ultimately, their chances at the polls. . . . we will make this election a referendum on whether our democracy should belong to the People as a whole or to the billionaire class alone.
Currently, the Democracy Spring website gives almost no information about actual grassroots activities going on in the country.

There is a map of numerous regional organizing hubs for contacting, but how activated these hubs are for what Democracy Spring is transitioning to following the April civil disobedience is unclear.

There was a Democracy Spring webinar last Thursday and also on Sunday. Subjects that were brought up during the Thursday webinar included (i) a Democracy Spring tool kit being prepared, (ii) paying greater attention to publicizing the corruption issue to the public (compared to April's targeting of Congress), (iii) actions directed against the party conventions in Cleveland and Philadelphia, and (iv) identifying Congressional races to target.

It would seem highly uncertain at this time how much and what kind of grassroots activity will take place between now and November 8th. It would also seem  that it is going to be exceedingly difficult for Democracy Spring to achieve anywhere near what it desires to achieve before November 8th, and thus that any grassroots activities should be encouraged by Democracy Spring, no matter how small.

If you are a FightBigMoney warrior who wants to do something concrete at the Congressional level, currently you will have to strain to seek it out.

I believe my 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations citizen effort is a credible grassroots activity worthy of consideration by any FightBigMoney warrior who wants something concrete to do.

When the Democracy Spring tool kit is put out, the 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations effort can be compared with grassroots activities that Democracy Spring proposes to its supporters.

I have been working on 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations since November, and it is concrete and well developed. Right now it is limited to Twitter.

I have sent more than twenty thousand tweets since November, there have been almost 50,000 page views of this blog, and there have been hundreds of retweets and likes of my tweets, which I interpret as supportive of my efforts.

There has been, however, virtually no sending of tweets (other than by myself) to candidates and to other voters, as set out in Tactics.

For serious FightBigMoney warriors, I ask these questions: Do you agree that it is going to be extremely difficult for Democracy Spring to engender meaningful grassroots activities before November 8th? What concrete things do you imagine yourself doing before November 8th? Do you agree that retweets and likes regarding 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations achieve very little? Do you agree that, if 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations is to have any chance of being worthwhile, there needs to be lots of FightBigMoney warriors who are willing to spend time sending tweets to candidates and to other voters, as set out in Tactics?

I know that sending tweets to candidates and to other voters likely lacks the social element which is present in person group activities of demonstrations, sign carrying, distributing written materials, and phone banking.

At the same time, the tweeting being sought can be helpfully done with modest amounts of time (an hour a week could be very adequate), and is very flexible for individuals to schedule themselves.

To try to make it easy to send tweets to candidates, I have sent my own tweets and have embedded my tweets in blog entries or put suggested tweet messages in blog entries, and these can be copied and pasted by a reader of the blog entry to send the reader's own tweets to the candidates. I have also created links in my blog entries which can be clicked on and the tweet in question pops up in a Twitter box for the reader to send via the reader's Twitter account. For an example of these, see the blog entry Tweet and shout at MD08.

For sending tweets to other voters, I have developed tweeting banks. See FL19 tweeting bank and CA12 tweeting bank as recent examples. California - U.S. Senate is a current work in progress. My tweeting banks were started at the Presidential election level, and CALIFORNIA - Last tweeting bank for Sen. Sanders is viable for use until June 7th.

Let me conclude this entry with these further questions: How can I persuade you to go beyond retweets and likes of tweets, and for you to send tweets to candidates and to other voters, as set out in Tactics? What changes or recommendations would you suggest for this blog that would make for more success in getting people to send tweets to candidates and to other voters, as set out in Tactics?

Please feel free to communicate with me by means of leaving comments below on this blog entry, or by emailing me at rdshattuck@gmail.com, or by becoming a member of this 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations google group and having discussion there.


UPDATE 5/26/16
A. The Democracy Spring Toolkit

Democracy Spring has released its Forcing a Choice Toolkit.

The Toolkit directs Democracy Spring workers to make email, tweet, telephone, and in person office communications to candidates/incumbents, with the object of getting them to sign The Equal Voice For All Declaration. The Toolkit gives guidance for selecting candidates/incumbents to target. The Toolkit provides links for logging contacts and logging signatures that are obtained, which are to be used by Democracy Spring to coordinate the collective effort being made.

If a candidate/incumbent signs The Equal Voice For All Declaration, the Democracy Spring worker is supposed to "lift up" the signer on the social media by praise and thanks in tweets and Facebook posts, and by sending letters to the editor, and "generally generate as much positive publicity as possible around their commitment to reform."

If a candidate/incumbent will not sign The Equal Voice For All Declaration  the Toolkit says that Democracy Spring workers should start organizing to expose the candidate/incumbent as a defender of the status quo, and Democracy Spring will be providing more support and guidance for local organizing soon.

The Toolkit sets out Interim Public Talking Points and indicates there will be weekly EVFA discussion on slack.

At the end of a separate GUIDELINES FOR EVFA OUTREACH, there is said:
We will continue to activate our fellow citizens by informing them about the existence of real solutions to political inequality and about our collective power to realize those solutions, even as Congress fails to take action.
B. Critique

1. How much grassroots activity will in fact be engendered?

The Toolkit is fine and dandy, but I don't think anyone can predict how much grassroots activity will in fact be engendered in the coming months.

MAYDAY's experience in 2015 may be instructive. MAYDAY spent most of 2015 getting its supporters to contact their Representatives in Congress  to ask the Representatives to commit to one or more pieces of specified reform legislation and thereby be added to MAYDAY's list of Leaders supporting fundamental reform. There are currently shown on the list 181 members of Congress out of a total of 533.

Towards the end of  2015, MAYDAY reported that 20,000 calls and voicemails had been made to Congress, and MAYDAY teams had met with 13 Congressional offices, including 4 members of Congress personally. I believe that many of the 181 members on the list had previously committed to reform before MAYDAY commenced its 2015 efforts, and MAYDAY's efforts in 2015 yielded only a modest number of additions to the list.

In gauging the result and significance of MAYDAY's efforts in 2015, consideration should be given to the stark partisan divide on the list of 181 being comprised of 179 Democrats, Republican Walter Jones, and Bernie Sanders.

2. The partisan divide on MAYDAY's list

In April I posed A question for DemSpring about the aforesaid partisan divide and DemSpring's quest to "unleash unstoppable momentum for deep reform" by revealing "exactly which side members of Congress stand on" and making "crystal clear" who is for reform and who is for the status quo. of who supports reform. I never received any answer to my question.

As I say at the end of A question for DemSpring, I think Democracy Spring runs "a serious risk of being just another one of numerous partisan gridlock matters that the American people despair of their broken Congress doing their job about, and, as such, disappears in the fog of the perpetual political war."

You can evaluate this for yourself in making any decision to follow Democracy Spring's lead.

3. The Toolkit does little for activating the voters

The Toolkit talks about
activat[ing] our fellow citizens by informing them about the existence of real solutions to political inequality and about our collective power to realize those solutions, even as Congress fails to take action.
Let's be frank: Our messaging powers just plain suck, compared to, say, tens of thousands of voters that Donald Trump can reach with a single tweet (which can get into the hundreds of thousands if his tweet is rebroadcast by the cable news). Bernie Sanders continues to get thousands of people hearing his messaging at rallies, and it too being rebroadcast by the cable news. We don't have money to do TV advertising or even US mail mailings or phone banking.

The Toolbox directs Democracy Spring workers to use conventional social media tweeting and Facebook posting to "lift up"  in the social media signers of The Equal Voice For All Declaration. The reach of this social media messaging is not trivial, but I have been urging for months that the reach can be very significantly expanded. See Breaking out of like minded social media circles.

Also I have urged that we try to do messaging that takes advantage of the immense attention being paid to the Trump and Sanders candidacies. My effort to do this started last July (see Proposed messaging re: Congress), and evolved into "tweeting banks" connected to the Presidential election, such as this last one CALIFORNIA - Last tweeting bank for Sen. Sanders.

MAYDAY (for more than a year) and Democracy Spring (since February) have been unresponsive to these ideas for improving our "sucky" messaging powers. This unresponsiveness continues with the Toolbox that Democracy Spring has issued.

4. Evaluating DeclareForDemocracy against the Toolkit proposal

I will continue to try to recruit participants to this  2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations citizen effort. I am very interesting in engaging with Democracy Spring about the same, but thus far Democracy Spring has shown no interest.

FeelTheBern tweeters are a possible pool of participants for 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations.

If I cannot get any participants, this will get dropped at some point.

UPDATE 5/27/16
This update is added specially in connection with tweets I am sending to those who have retweeted or liked my tweets previously. I have had at least a couple hundred retweets and likes, which I interpret as showing interest in my efforts. I have also received many reply tweets similarly showing interest, and I have passed a lot of these along to MAYDAY, Democracy Spring and other organizations. Below (from yesterday and today) is an example.

For months I have not been able to get any reaction from these organizations. They can best explain why, and I will not try to speculate. I will use the contact email address given in the Toolkit to call attention to this again.
For the instant purposes, there is not currently any help from the organizations relative to this citizen effort, and, for the time being, to the extent anyone steps forward to participate, I will need to do the organizing of participants.
From Rob Shattuck <rdshattuck@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, May 27, 2016 at 11:11 AM 
Subject: 206 Congressional candidates' Declarations
To madura.tania@gmail.com
Dear Tania,
For months, many FightBigMoney warriors and many Senator Sanders supporters have expressed interest in my 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations citizen effort.
I think these people, in making a decision to participate or not, are deserving of some comment by Democracy Spring about the 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations effort. Such comment might be expression of encouragement to those persons who think they would like to participate in the citizen effort, or, if Democracy Spring has reasons why it thinks people should not participate in the 2016 Congressional candidates' Declarations effort, a statement of those reasons, which prospective participants can evaluate in making their decision, or Democracy Spring may have other comment to make.
If Democracy Spring will kindly send me an email making such comment, I will post the email on this Taking the next step blog entry.
Thank you very much for your consideration of this matter.
Sincerely,