Wow (4.00 / 2)

I'm stunned you decided to post this without even trying to respond to any of the ongoing questions about this group.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/...

Instead, we just get more knee jerk defensiveness. Do you know if "the board" knows about everything going on? Why has this group had to repeatedly apologize for making the same mistakes over and over?

Arguments from authority don't impress me. I'm looking for rational answers to legitimate questions.

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by: Semblance @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 02:04:52 AM UTC

right (0.00 / 0)

Because I have to write exactly what you want me to write.  If you are suspicious, I have to be suspicious.  Is that how it goes?  I can't just blog an observation and some possible political ramifications, I have to defend WVWV or attack it or something.

Ok, I'm glad we've established the rules for what and when I must write and what mob mentality attacks I must participate in and which ones I can avoid.

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by: Matt Stoller @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 02:09:42 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Of course the mob might be right (0.00 / 0)

You guys are far closer to being establishment types than we 'mobsters'.

It is an interesting divide between the hoi polloi users/customers and the writers/admins/owners/D.C types here at Open Left.

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by: Matt H @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 12:44:48 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

distraction (0.00 / 0)

Maybe the Obama campaign just wants a distraction from its own problem.

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by: AliceDem @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 02:20:29 AM UTC

Weird that neither the Wa Po or NPR, IIRC mentions that 1-stop (4.00 / 3)

early voting, w. same day registration, was still going on in NC.
I guess that's your typical MSM over-simplification, but to me the ease of same day reg. significantly magnifies the caliber of the robo-call fuck-up.
     

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by: sb @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 02:56:10 AM UTC

I can think of a couple of potential rationales. (4.00 / 2)

First, perhaps the Obama campaign is trying to send a message to those very supporters who the campaign feels might not be taking things seriously enough.

Second, perhaps the campaign is putting pressure on the WVWV publicly to help the directors if they are getting the run-around from the WVWV staff.

Or perhaps they genuinely don't know if this is intentional or not and figure that public pressure on them will decrease the possibility of more problems if they are doing this intentionally and cause no harm if they are legitimate mistakes. If they are mistakes, they are significant ones and ones where while no one needs to be fired, new procedures should be put in place to make sure it doesn't happen again.

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by: inflector @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 03:14:47 AM UTC

I can think of a third rationale. (0.00 / 0)

Now Obama's campaign has an excuse if they don't meet expectations. They can suggest that NC votes were suppressed and progressive bloggers can darkly hint at evildoings by the Clinton Campaign.

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by: JohnS @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 13:00:06 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Lambert, of course an unrepentent Clinton supporter made some observations (4.00 / 2)

He muses that WVWV's drive began just when the Obama campaign began their own registration drive.  And maybe, just like they shut down the independent Facebook site for their own, they wanted to eliminate or cast doubt on a rival registration drive.

It is spculative...I am eliminating some of the anti Obama snark so it doesn't inflame people so they can grapple with the ideas out forward in this post.

http://www.correntewire.com/wa...

2. Since the Obama organization is now organizing its own voter registration drive, why would they want any competing organization to thrive? They've never wanted that, all the way back to suppressing the original Obama FaceBook site, which was run by volunteers, and replacing it with one of they controlled. So, smearing the WVWV not only eliminates a competitor, it sends a shot across the bow to all those on the WVWV's board who aren't already Obama loyalists.

snip

Why don't we take Obama and the OFB at their word? They're a movement. In conseqence, we can start to see them as a movement that's trying to take power through the Democratic Party - and from a rather weak base, at that - as opposed to being part of the Democratic Party.

Treating Obama's campaign as a movement, rather than as a party faction, would explain why they're so willing to burn what we regard as Democratic Party assets for the general - by trying to drive the Clintons from public life by smearing them as racists, or by smearing parts of the Democratic base that don't support Obama as racists, or Archie Bunkers, or low information voters - not to mention the Hillary hatred and the relentless misogyny. What we Democrats regard as assets, movement Obama supporters regard as obstacles to control of the party by their movement.*

Obviously, if the Obama Movement has a real institutional presence - and what's more institutional than a massive database combined with a voter registration drive - .....

I think it's intriguing...the Facebook reference resonated.....and why would they make it harder for a group that is registering voters that will vote Democratic in the November election....What does it gain them...It's why you said "Weird"    

"Incrementalism isn't a different path to the same place, it could be a different path to a different place"
Stoller

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by: debcoop @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 03:19:24 AM UTC

Facebook? (0.00 / 0)

Doesn't he mean myspace?  How could it "resonate" with you when apparently neither you nor Lambert know what group was involved?


New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 03:45:54 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I honestly don't do either one (0.00 / 0)

so to me they are the same ...honest...this is part of the internet I don't participate in.

But I do remember the controversy very very well.  I remember the bafflement the original volunteer and coordinator felt at having this which he had started and nurtured taken away from him.


"Incrementalism isn't a different path to the same place, it could be a different path to a different place"
Stoller

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by: debcoop @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 06:25:37 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Joe Anthony was just a DFH (0.00 / 0)

who outlived his usefulness. Like Jeremiah Wright. Like Kos.

There is definitely a pattern here. The Obama campaign clotheslined WVWV for the same reason as the others, to send a message to Republican and Independent voters that Obama will not govern as a liberal.

Montani semper liberi

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by: Sadie Baker @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 11:31:08 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

They mean Facebook. He's right there. (0.00 / 0)

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by: sb @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 12:56:37 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

... no malicious intent.... (0.00 / 0)

The little I cite as the gist does not do justice to the article.  Matt Stoller is among those cited/interviewed.

Salon -- War Room
By Alex Koppelman
FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2008 16:46 EDT
Voter suppression in North Carolina?
http://www.salon.com/politics/...

...  charge based on no solid evidence of wrongdoing. ... conclusion that the group responsible had no malicious intent, but is just another well-intentioned but bungling....

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by: old91A10 @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 03:29:17 AM UTC

One Vote Supressed, Intimidated or Confused... (4.00 / 1)

is a vote lost.  

Signed a former executive director of a TRUE 501C3.

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by: tired of weakness @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 03:39:30 AM UTC

Confusion came home this evening (4.00 / 2)

My wife brought home a voter registration flyer sent to her office address. She said she also got a call about the flyer too. In very bold letters, the flyer had two primary messages:

"Voter registration laws require you to submit an official application in order to vote."  
and
"The deadline for voter registration is approaching."

The flyer somewhat confused her because she's been registered to vote and has been a supervoter for the past twelve years.  She wanted to know if I thought she needed to send this in.  (I do a lot of campaign election stuff so she knows I know the law and rules very well.)

I scoured the flyer and, aha, in very small print I found WVWV.  Even if I had never heard of WVWV before, I wouldn't have thought highly of that flyer:

* It was sent to her business address and had that address preprinted in the application as her home address.  I would have hoped WVWV would have filtered out business addresses from its mailing list--or at least not preprinted them as a home address.

* We live in Florida. Our registration deadline for the general is October 6. Why are they sending this in May...and with several urgent messages that the deadline is soon?

* I expect the application would pass muster with the registrar's office but when compared to the registrar's official instructions, some of the flyer's instructions are incomplete or inconsistent and others are somewhat misleading--even on required data.

* Only one small note at the end of the flyer acknowledged the possibility that the recipient may already be registered. The note said to send an email to be taken off their mailing list but that small note was followed by large letters proclaiming, "Sign and return the attached voter registration application today."

I appreciate the effort but the execution has some deficits. At a minimum, I would expect an early Fall mailing would have been much more effective.  Also I wish it had more visibly acknowledged that the application is moot if the recipient is already registered.  

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by: sawgrass @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 06:57:19 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

WVWV and Jerome Armstrong (0.00 / 0)

Hey Matt, do you know anything about the fact that WVWV is a client of Jerome Armstrong's WebStrong consulting/PR firm?

http://www.mydd.com/story/2008...

How come I had to find out about this through digging through a bunch of stuff rather than, you know, reading it on the blog he allowed a front-page "nothing to see here" article to run?

Has he been in touch with you about this at all?  His firm is actively engaged in their current CYA activities, which makes me a little peeved that nobody said anything.

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by: jakester @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 13:58:27 PM UTC

Should WVW continue its work pending the outcome of investigation? (0.00 / 0)

You write,

"In this situation, it would be extremely easy for the Obama campaign to publicly praise WVWV and privately harangue them through surrogates.  That would both prevent any problems and allow a progressive group to continue its work."

You seem to be operating from the assumption that because WVWV is "progressive," it should be allowed to "continue its work." I disagree for several reasons. First, WVWV is being investigated by the NC Attorney General for a robocalling operation that violated state law. Members of the WVWV board have also said that the board will investigate what happened. Surely it makes sense to wait for the results of these investigations before concluding that WVWFV ought to continue its work.

Second, WVWV has engaged in a pattern and practice of misleading and confusing robocalls in several states, right around the time of the primaries in those states. Even the most charitable toward WVWV concede that its activities in these states show massive incompetence. Why should an incompetent voter registration organization -- one that is engaging in tactics that, at the very least, cannot meet the organization's professed goal -- continue its work?

Third, the conflicts of interest within WVWV that have come to light recently as a result of the NPR and Facing South investigations are truly stunning to anyone who has worked within the world of non-profits or served on non-profit boards. The large contracts with members of the "leadership team," including some that involve questionable functions ($88,000 to Maggie Williams' firm for "strategic planning" -- since when does it cost $88,000 to develop a strategic plan?) raise a huge red flag. Especially when combined with the incompetence those contractors have shown.

Finally, and ironically, a recent book by two Yale political science professors, Donald Green and Alan Gerber,
Get Out The Vote: How to Increase Voter Turnout, concluded that using direct mail and robocalls for GOTV purposes are generally ineffective. Political Wire quotes the authors as saying, "Direct mail is expensive, and its capacity to mobilize voters is typically rather limited." About robocalls, Green and Gerber say they "might help you to stretch your resources in ways that allow you to contact the maximum number of people, but don't expect to move them very much, if at all." They conclude that "Door-to-door canvassing is by far the most effective form of getting voters to the polls. There is also some evidence that newspaper ads might be effective."

One of the questions I would put to the WVWV board is why, since the organization claims to be research-driven and given the findings of research, WVWV has chosen the direct-mail and robo-calling strategy in the first place.  

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by: Dunyazad @ Tue May 06, 2008 at 18:27:05 PM UTC