Do you experience despair, anxiety, anger or depression, . . .
when you contemplate the climate crisis, public corruption, our nation's endless wars of foreign aggression, the maldistribution of wealth, racial injustice, the violence and harassment which women endure daily or . . .
Taking action can serve as an antidote to that despair. Your public service, with sufficient organization could actually contribute to reversing course on our species' leap over the cliff.
Whether you ever put your name on a ballot or not, . . .
If you cannot un-know what you understand about the state of the world, please take a few minutes to see if what we offer might help you channel those uncomfortable feelings in some healthy and productive directions.
The despair is not unwarranted.
In a series of interviews given in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United v FEC (558 US 310, 2010), former President of the United States Jimmy Carter described our nation as an oligarchy in which 'unlimited political bribery' is key to winning major party nominations of federal office. But Citizens United was only the latest insult to our nation's democratic aspirations. The Supreme Court's ruling in Buckley v Valeo (424 US 1, 1974) had already conflated money with speech to strike down key components of the post-Watergate Federal Elections Campaign Act, stating that "limiting the use of money for political purposes constitutes a restriction on communication violative of the First Amendment, since virtually all meaningful political communications in the modern setting involve the expenditure of money". With the gates wide open to the flow of dark money in election campaigns, political corruption faces no barriers and elected officials act with impunity to serve their corporate contributors while erecting ever more barriers to the meaningful participation of the voters, which their rhetoric would have us believe they serve.
While polar ice caps are melting, the corporations which profit from our culture's addiction to fossil fuels are celebrating new shipping lanes between the resources of Asia and markets in North America; new opportunities to mine the oil underneath the Artic ocean. The International Panel on Climate Change has documented a global scientific consensus on the existential threat of the catastrophic climate crisis. Meanwhile the United Nations Environmental Programme has hosted a series of conferences bringing together national leadership from across the planet only to have the critical initiatives of each torpedo'd by the corrupted political leadership of the industrial nations beholden to the monied interests they prioritize over the future of human life on this planet.
Although a 2019 study of data collected by the Center for Disease Control and published by the National Academy of Science indicates that police officers are the 6th leading cause of death for young men in America and that the lives at greatest risk are black, brown and disabled young men; the Section 1033 "Excess Property Program" created by the Clinton Administration's 1997 National Defense Authorization Act is being used to funnel surplus military equipment into the hands of civilian law enforcement agencies; equipping our local police agencies to militarize the communities they are funded to serve and protect.
F William Engdahl's 1992 history documeted "A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order. His work asks us to ignore the assassination of Arch-Duke Ferdinand and points us instead to the near completion of the Berlin-Bhagdad Railroad intended to fuel industrial development in the Ruhr Valley with Iraqui oil as the root cause of World War I. In 2022 there is growing evidence that the Biden Administration is likely responsible for the destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines delivering natural gas from Russian oil fields for German industrial use and residential heating. If true this is only the latest assault on that sovereign nation by the Biden Administration which has been waging a proxy US / NATO war on Russia over the lives and lands of the Ukraine, by using US tax dollars to fund and arm actual nazis running that Eastern European nations since the Maidan Square coup of 2014, also instigated and funded by the U.S. State Department.
In 2017, Oxfam reported that the wealth of the eight richest men on the planet exceeded that of the poorest half of the global population. A similar study in the early 1990s put that number at nearly four hundred of the super-rich. Oxfam's 2022 "Inequality Kills" study reports that "The wealth of the world’s 10 richest men has doubled since the pandemic began. The incomes of 99% of humanity are worse off because of COVID-19."
The 1971 Powell Memorandum to the US Chamber of Commerce laid out the oligarch's strategy. They have faithfully implemented it ever since.
Here in the United States, the decline in the economic position of working people can be directly traced to public policies like:
- the Truman era 1948 Taft-Hartley Act (denying unions our most effective organizing tools);
- the Reagan Administration's 1981 Economic Recovery Act (passed with broad support from Democrats, slashing the marginal tax rate on high income taxpayers from 70 percent to 50%);
- then the Reagan Administration Tax Reform Act of 1986 (cutting the tax rate on the richest tax payers to less than 30%);
- The 1976 Higher Education Act introduced the idea of denying discharge under federal bankrupcty law of student loans;
- in the 1980's Regan era regulatory changes combined with austerity budgets tilted financing for post-secondary education from public sector grants to private sector loans launching the rise of student debt peonage leaving people unable to retire because they still carry student debt now as they near social security eligibility;
- then in 2005, now President, then U.S. Senator Biden 'was an avid supporter' of a 2005 reform codified as the "Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act" redefining the 'undue hardship requirement' applying these insurmountable barriers to discharge to far more borrowers;
- 1999, Clinton signed the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act repealing most of the protections enacted by the Glass–Steagall Banking Act of 1933, recreating the same abuses which led to the collapse of commercial banks at the onset of the Great Depression, and paving the way for the economic collapse of 2008, with its bailouts for banks 'too big to fail' and a sub-prime / foreclosure / predatory lending crisis which left ten million of our neighbors without their homes in a few short years.
Michelle Alexander's book, "The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness" tracks the campaign rhetoric, public policies (including mandatory minimums, truth-in-sentencing, repeat offender sentencing, the privatization of public prisons, treating addiction as a criminal matter, among others), and the decimation of Constitutional protections by the Federal Judiciary (appointed by Presidential Administrations, confirmed by Congress) which gave rise to a metioric rise in our domestic prison population. Our nation represents 4.2% of global population but we lock up 20% of the world's prisoners. The Bureau of Justice Statistics (US DoJ) reports that 1 of 47 of our neighbors are under some form of judicial supervision: locked up, on probation or on parole. In some states that ratio is much higher. Black folks account for one in eight of US citizens, but nearly two in five of its inmates. It has been public policy which has made our nation a penal colony for so many of our neighbors.
Dawn Wilcox (Women Count USA) has documented nearly five women murdered by men each day in 2018. Roughly one in six women in this country have been raped in their lifetime, nearly a half million each year. 81% of women have experienced sexual harrassment. On the job harrassment results in roughly 7,000 EEOC reports annually. One in three women have been assaulted by an intimate partner, with one in seven injured as a result and one in ten raped. The US Census Bureau and Pew Research report that women make $0.83 for every dollar paid to men. Those numbers are even more discouraging for black and brown women.
Although the Equal Rights Amendment has finally been ratified by the necessary 38 states to make it 'for all intents and purposes' a part of the US Constitution, first the Trump and now the Biden Administration have failed to acknowledge this milestone by publishing a finding that it has been ratified to the Federal Register.
The U.S. Supreme Court with its 1992 decision in Casey v Planned Parenthood overturned its finding in the 1973 case Roe v Wade, that infringement on women's privacy rights by state restrictions on access to abortion were subject to the strict scrutiny of the Courts. In its 2022 decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women's Health Organization, the Court found that women have no right to due process under the 14th amendment in such cases, and in fact that abortion was not at all a sex-based restriction entitling women to any sort of heightened judicial scrutiny.
The Universal Declaration on Human Rights, in Article 25, states (in part): "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including . . . medical care . . . " Seventy-one nations have some form of universal access to health care. Seventeen nations use a single-payer model for the provision of health care. But the United States is unique among industrial nations in its system of private provision of health care, which threatens bankruptcy and homelessness for even those who carry private insurance. The Obama Administrations' Affordable Care Act did little to alleviate this threat, offering the insurance industry a captive market and saddling tax payers with penalties for failure purchase over-priced inferior products which allows insurance providers to deny access to health care recommended by a patient's care provider.
The Despair May be Warranted, but Action can be Our Antidote
Its understandable to be overwhelmed by the multiple crisis we face, by a system rigged against us, and corrupted to its very core by the private money funding public elections.
Its true. The institutions which are supposed to serve us are near universally corrupt and rigged to serve the oligarchs rather than our families and our neighbors. Despair, depression, denial and escape are understandable reactions to the overwhelming odds and the hopeless circumstances we face.
And yet, action can be an antidote to despair.
Even in the face of such overwhelming odds, it is our remaining in action which can serve as an alternative to that despair, depression, denial and escapism. Afterall, it has been the collective action of working people facing the impossible odds of their own generation which originally earned us many of the victories whose loss we would now grieve.
The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. often paraphrased an 18th Century abolitionist named Theodore Parker who argued in one of his sermons published in 1853 that:
I do not pretend to understand the moral universe, the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. But from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice.
Dr. King offered an address to the 11th Annual Southern Chistian Leadership Conference Convention on August 16th, 1967. We know it now as his "Where do we go from here?" speech, a theme he elaborated on in a book of the same name. He told this Atlanta Convention:
the movement must address itself to restructuring the whole of American society. . . . (and a couple of minutes later, that) . . . when I say questioning the whole society, it means ultimately coming to see that the problems of racism, the problems of economic exploitation and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated. . . . America (must) be born again, . . . (and he challenged us) . . . to be dissatisfied until every state capitol be housed by a Governor who will do justly, who will love mercy and who will walk humbly with his God, let us be dissatisfied. Until from every City Hall, justice will roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream, let us be dissatisfied. I must confess, my friends that the road ahead will not always be smooth. There will still be rocky places of frustration, meandering points of bewliderment, there will be inevitable setbacks here and there. There will be those moments when the bouyancy of hope will be transformed into the fatigue of despair. Our dreams will sometimes be shattered. Our ethereal hopes blasted. We may again with tear-drenched eyes have to stand before the burial of some courageous civil rights worker whose life will be snuffed out by the dastardly acts of a blood thirsty mob. Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future. . . . Let us realize that the arc of the moral universe is long, but that it bends towards justice.
Despite the faith of the transcendentalists, it is hardly inevitable that this 'moral arc' 'bend towards justice'. Achieving that end will take works of women and men willing to sacrifice for that goal.
The forces of political reaction gathered and formulated a strategy in the aftermath of the 1964 Johnson-Goldwater race. They built social, cultural and political institutions. They funded think tanks. They mobilized a growing army of foot soldiers who contested for public office at every level of government and in every election cycle.
The policy and political setbacks we have suffered in our generation are the result of plans laid and grassroots organizing done over the past sixty years and more. And if we are to bend that arc back towards a just future worthy of handing as our generation's legacy to the next one, it will require that we mobilize at a similar scale.
It will require that we step up and exhibit the courage of our political convictions and contest for political power in our own right.
This course is my invitation that
you participate in just such an effort.
In this weekend long program, we will cover, . . .
So what does this program cost?
Well there are a few ways to look at that question.
Our inaction is costly.
First, we know what our inaction is already costing us: ecological collapse, economic deprivation, serfdom, our Constitutional liberties, any hope of having a legacy worthy of passing along to our children. Such a legacy being discussed here is not simply that which might be accounted for in estate planning and finalized in probate court after our death. No, here we are discussing the cultural, societal and ecological legacy on which an economic legacy necessarily depends; without which an economic legacy is not possible.
But lets assume for the moment that you are inspired -- whether by the events already unfolding in the world and in your life, or perhaps by the pitch above -- that you have a role in this effort to organize for political power, to put yourself out there as a public servant, perhaps even as a candidate for public office. Know that doing so is not without its challenges and risks. Doing so without attention to the material we cover in this Before You Qualify Challenge could cost you a marriage, a job, fines from the campaign finance compliance agency in your jurisdiction, votes and an election.
Or, for a weekend of your time and not much more than the cost of a single fine as would be charged here in Georgia by our Ethics Commission for a late campaign disclosure report, you can participate in our Before You Qualify Challenge and learn how to prepare yourself and those in your life for the real challenge of offering yourself for public service, maybe even as a candidate for public service.
There are also opportunity costs to consider.
- An election cycle is generally only two years long and there is not a moment of that to waste if it your intention to win the next election.
- I intend to offer this BYQ Challenge once every two or three months. if you miss this opportunity, it will likely be early next year before another opportunity becomes available.
- While I am beta testing this new program, and working out the kinks before a live audience for the first couple of times, I am offering a discount which amounts to slightly more than a 50% discount on the price I intend to offer this program for once I am satisfied with its form. So registering as a member of the first or second cohort is likely to save you half or more of the registration fee.
- Just as the political world rewards decisiveness, I also appreciate and want to work with action takers. Below I provide a discount code worth an additional 23% discount for the first fifty registrants.
You get clarity and a game plan OR you get your money back
This weekend long challenge is designed to provide you with both
- clarity on whether a run for public office is right for you at this time and
- enough of a game plan to inform your next steps for a campaign launch.
If you enroll, attend every session, invest your time and energy into the exercises, complete the assignments and you still lack clarity both for whether a run for public office is in your future and if so, what is required to get started on such a campaign, then please write and let me know and I will refund your registration fee. Its simple.
Bonuses
a $48.50 value
Your registration includes access to our downloadable workbook, providing a place where you can complete the exercises, organize your notes on the insights gained from the course materials and make note of the ideas which will form the basis of a campaign strategy and plan, should you choose to run for public office. This workbook will be filled with resources useful to developing a campaign plan.
growing ever more valuable with the participation of each new registrant
We're working to build a community of people like yourself. This private group is a place for those ready to set aside the despair and funnel their time, energy and skills taking action to help our culture, society, nation and the global community climb out of the interlocking crisis we face. The triple evils of oppression, materialism and imperialism can and will defeat us unless we stand together, build our capacity and wake up every day executing on a strategy to not just pull us back from the brink, but also to chart a course for the just and sustainable future we know is possible for our kids. Help us make this a group a place where we can collaborate towards that end.
To start, as we beta test this program, we are hosting this group on facebook, but have plans of eventually migrating it in house to accommodate users who choose not to use facebook.
a $100.00 value
I began my work as a political consultant by hanging out a shingle as CampaignFoundations.com in the Winter of 2005, offering web application hosting and development. I still offer such hosting services today, and the applications which I host, the platforms on which I host and the systems I use to deploy them continue to mature, become more stable and featureful.
As a bonus for those who register for this Before You Qualify Challenge, I am offering a 50% discount on the installation fees for our List-Builders Plan providing a platform for your campaign or organization's website and Constituent Relationship Management database.
To recap, here is what you get, . . .
The Before You Qualify core curriculum, . . .
- Friday Evening
- getting our house in order
- debunking the marginalizing myths
- essential conversations you must have prior to going public
- Saturday Morning
- understanding the mechanics of a campaign
- assembling the public data relevant to your campaign
- budgeting resources sufficient to victory
- Sunday Morning
- enrolling the policy advisors
- embracing fundraising
- assembling a campaign team
- Wednesday Evening
- Next Steps
Plus the Bonuses, . . .
- the workbook
- a social channel for peer support
- discount on installation fee if you choose to host with us
So the choice is yours.
We already know what the despair is like. And as outlined above, it is certainly understandable why we might prefer to medicate that depression and despair by binge watching reruns of old TV shows or indulging in addictions even worse for our bodies, our selves and our families.
The do nothing option is clearly on the table. And soon enough, this option will impose its own logic. Just ask the scientific consensus behind the recommendations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Or, . . .
You can engage in the process of public service, organizing for the social and policy changes which might help us fight our way back from the abyss, and provide future generations a viable option for sustaining life on this planet.
If you choose the former option, you can stock up on the popcorn and enjoy the show until the economic and ecological collapse. But if you choose the latter option, you still face a choice.
[[ To be clear, you do not have to give up popcorn fueled time with your favorite shows to serve your community. Being an organizer and a public servant is difficult work, and a regimine of self care is necessary to sustain ourselves for the long game we must play for success. ]]
It can take years sorting out how to operate effectively as a community organizer and public servant. I have certainly spent a lifetime learning the craft. I built this road not only by walking it, but also instructed and inspired by those who had done similar work before me. It was nearly thirty-five years ago that within a few months of each other I took a weekend long workshop on community organizing offered by the Citizens Clearinghouse on Hazardous Waste and another workshop on electoral organizing. I have spent the three some decades since honing the craft forged against an anvil of real world experience on a variety of issues and multiple campaigns; and by being engaged in one or more electoral races in every intervening election cycle; by engaging in work to change public policy in between the elections. I've won some struggles and lost others, but I have never stopped reading and learning, seeking the wisdom of my elders in our movement and being informed by the communities I've worked for, by the struggles I have engaged in.
So the choice is yours.
You can consume a bowl of popcorn watching your favorite shows as all around us we bear witness to ecological collapse, economic deprivation, serfdom, the erosion of our Constitutional liberties.
Or as Mother Jones would have put it, you can fight like hell for the living.
And choosing to engage with us in this fight for our survival, you can choose to figure this work out on your own, or you can let me help you fast track your learning curve and support your effectiveness as a community organizer and public servant; and possibly as a candidate for public office.
FAQ
Questions about the Before You Qualify Challenge --
As our guarantee puts it, you will get clarity and a game plan or you get your money back.
This weekend long challenge is designed to provide you with both
- clarity on whether a run for public office is right for you at this time and
- enough of a game plan to inform your next steps for a campaign launch.
For details on the schedule and logistics of participating, see the FAQ below related to program logistics.
This program will use the pre- announcement preparation process for potential candidates for public office as a vehicle for training anyone engaged in public service whether as a candidate for public office or not.
Public service takes many forms. They too serve who are:
- volunteers or staff members on the campaigns of others; or
- seeking to serve in leadership or key volunteer roles for community, labor or congregational organizations engaged with advocacy or service delivery.
While some of the material covered will necessarily focus on the needs of potential candidates for public office, half or more of the material covered might be easily adapted to the use of others engaged in public service, particularly for those engaged in organizing focused on public policy advocacy.
Enrolling in this program does not obligate you to run for public office. It provides you instead with:
- an opportunity to clarify for yourself whether you are ready for a run for public office,
- to guide you in making yourself ready for such a run in the future; and
- to provide enough of an overview that should you be ready to take the next step along that path, you will have a game plan to prepare you for the campaign launch.
This weekend long challenge is designed to provide you with both
- clarity on whether a run for public office is right for you at this time, and
- enough of a game plan to inform your next steps for a campaign launch.
The material covered in this program is necessary, but not sufficient to mounting a successful campaign for public office. Those who (1) complete this course, and (2) are clear that they are or will soon be ready to launch a campaign for public office will be invited to participate in a twelve week Waging a Viable Campaign coaching program intended to prepare candidates to effectively campaign for public office in the coming election cycle. Enrollment in our Waging a Viable Campaign can not guarantee you victory at the ballot box. Much is left to what you do with that opportunity, how effectively you apply what you learn, the opposition you face, how well funded your opposition is and the temperament and preferences of the voters in your district. But our coaching is intended to position you and your politics in the best light for success in your district; to share with you the skills and strategies which can potentially overcome the the power of corporate money financing your political opposition.
Questions about program logistics --
The challenge anticipates that you will spend perhaps half an hour once you register on on-boarding tasks (marking your calendar, scheduling reminders, subscribing to our support channel and reviewing a brief video and pdf to outline expectations for both your participation and our deliverables).
After that, the training will be conducted across a weekend over three sessions, plus an opportunity to check in Wednesday evening for a debrief and to discuss next steps. We will meet Friday evening at 8pm, Saturday and Sunday mornings, starting at 12noon. After a couple of days off to contemplate what you have learned in this program, our Wednesday night event starts at 8:00 pm.
It is my aim that no session go will longer than two hours (but see the caveat in the next paragraph). These training programs are hosted in the Eastern time zone and you will need to make adjustments for your local time zone. On Wednesday evening we will gather one final time to check in and discuss what has opened up for you from the training you participated in across the weekend. On Wednesday evening, we will also take some time to share with you a brief introduction to our 12 week coaching program, Waging a Viable Campaign.
During our beta-launch of this new program, as I am still working the kinks out, please expect the sessions to last as long as three hours. As the expression goes, if I had had more time, I would have written a shorter letter. It is my intention to eventually cover the material in two hour sessions. But in the interest of managing your expectations and allowing for the development of this program to unfold as I present it before a live audience for the first couple of times, please allow for three hours in your schedule. This is part of the reason I am offering the beta-launch discounts.
In addition, as part of your onboarding process and after each day we will offer homework exercises that are each designed to be completed in an hour or less. As soon as you register you will get access to the first homework assignment I am asking you to complete before our first session.
VIP-Access
For those who upgrade to the VIP-access, I will be hosting Ask-Me-Anything sessions on Saturday and Sunday evening. These are expected to run an hour or ninety minutes each. In addition the VIP-access upgrade includes additional training intended for you to invite your campaign treasurer and manager, for a total of four additional group training sessions, during which I will go into further depth about their roles in your potential campaign. These events will usually take place on the weekend, but at any rate will be scheduled as best I can to accommodate those who are eligible to participate. The VIP-access also includes a one hour consultation with the key leadership where we can focus exclusively on your local campaign. This consultation will be scheduled at the convenience of your key campaign leadership.
Yes. We have homework assignments for each step of the challenge. The information and experience shared with our lecture material is valuable, of course. But it can not be nearly as valuable as your taking the steps to put that learning to work. The Challenge is not in sitting through virtual lectures. The Challenge exists if your consideration of what we cover in those virtual sessions and your application of those ideas and concepts to your local situation, your local community, your own potential candidacy for public office. Each homework assignment is designed to be completed in an hour or less.
Absolutely.
Being one of those (nearly) mono-lingual dumb-Americans, as the joke goes, all sessions and materials are designed for an English speaking audience. That being said, even if your native tongue is not English, if you are able to read and understand English, you can gain value from this program.
My own experience with electoral organizing is limited to campaigns in the United States and two campaigns in Canada. But this Before You Qualify Challenge covers material for which local laws governing elections are usually irrelevant. Where our material touches on the statutory framework governing the conduct of elections, I try to be careful to advise our participants to investigate their local regulatory environment for themselves.
The connection between your browser and our website is protected with end-to-end encryption, using SSL technology and an ssl certificate. If you ever find that our certificate has expired, please write to us at support@campaignfoundations.com and we will fix that immediately, and let you know when you can try again. We use stripe to process your payments. We do not store your debit card numbers on our servers, but instead store only a transaction id issued to us by our card processor.
No, for our Before You Qualify Challenge, we ask for payment in full and up front for this weekend long program.
For the first fifty registrants who participate while we are still beta-testing our program, we do offer a discount if you register with the coupon code: BYQ-50-beta.
No, we do not provide scholarships. We believe our rates are reasonable. Given our costs for identifying and enrolling participants, our margins are small and frankly we are concerned if we can afford to offer this program at this rate.
We are ready to support you in your examination of whether a run for public office is right for you. There is too much at stake, which relies on our ability to build and sustain the capacity to offer this opportunity to potential candidates. We are fully invested in the success of participants enrolled in this program. We need you to have some skin in the game, too.
If you already have a campaign committee registered with your campaign finance compliance agency, it is likely possible in most jurisdictions to fund your participation out of campaign funds. But we understand this creates a chicken-and-the-egg delimma for many though perhaps not all folks who would be considering this program. Even if you have already created your campaign committee, consider please joining us. You might find what this program offers to be a valuable contribution to your campaign development. And of course if this describes you, then yes, in most jurisdictions the training and consulting we offer is a completely legitimate campaign expense.
If you really cannot afford to fund this expense out of your own back pocket, write us please about how you can create a campaign committee to pay for your participation in this program as a campaign expense. You can then (1) loan the registration fee to your campaign committee, (2) have the campaign committee pay your registration fee and (3) use what you learn in this program to raise the campaign funds necessary (4) to repay the personal loan you made to seed the start-up of the campaign committee.
Questions about Campaign Foundations Consulting --
My name is Hugh Esco. I hung out a shingle in 2005 as Campaign Foundations.
I have participated in one or more electoral campaigns in one capacity or another every year since 1989. From 1989 until 2004 I worked part or full time in every regular session and intervening special sessions at the Georgia General Assembly, where I did legislative monitoring and advocacy work for a number of not-for-profit community organizations. I did some limited contract work for state legislators conducting research, organizing hearings and such. For one session I researched, wrote and published each morning a daily briefing for the Legislative Black Caucus outlining the contents and highlighting concerns for every bill on the Rules Calendar, scheduled for debate and vote that day. In the 109th Congress, I served as a Special Assistant to a member of the U.S. Congress, working in her office on the Hill in DC.
I have engaged with with advocacy campaigns on matters of public policy at the Federal, state and local level every year since 1988, working on a wide number of issues and developing subject matter expertise in several areas of public policy. I have drafted bills, amendments, reports and testimony throughout this experience. As a lobbyist for the local bicycle community, I sheparded into the Georgia Code uncontroversial rules-of-the-road changes. I have participated in multiple efforts, many of them successful, to defeat or amend bad legislation. I have organized and led at least two statewide coalitions to advance the legislative priorities of organizations I have served.
I have litigated ballot access barriers in Georgia facing candidates of emerging political parties or otherwise independent of the corporate parties. I engaged our legal team on appeal, authored two affidavits and consulted with our counsel at every step on strategy in our successful challenge, Georgia Green Party vs. Kemp, 171 F. Supp. 3d 1340 (N.D. Ga. 2016), which overturned the 1% petitioning barrier for Presidential candidates seeking access to the Georgia ballot.
I have myself run for office four times, twice for the state Assembly and twice for Lieutenant Governor of Georgia.
Disclaimers for the Before You Qualify Challenge
Terms used in this disclaimer have the meaning ascribed to them by our Terms and Conditions document.
Those Terms and Conditions disclaim generally, that . . .
You understand that neither YMD Partners, nor its owner, employees or contractors, has promised, nor shall be obligated to, the following:
- the success in your business or campaign, the results of our marketing efforts, sales for the client, or election results.
- providing assistance, as either coach or mentor, with consultations for future business contracts made by the client.
- procure any publicity, social media exposure, interviews, write-ups, features, television, or print promotions for the Client.
Client understands that an ongoing business relationship does not exist between the Parties after the conclusion of the program or contract for services.
In addition, any disclaimer attached in the promotion of any specific service, product or program offered by YMD Partners shall be construed to be a part of this disclaimer as if it were included in these Terms and Conditions.
Specifically, with respect to the Before You Qualify Challenge, we disclaim that . . .
The material covered in this program is necessary, but not sufficient to mounting a successful campaign for public office. Even enrollment in our Waging a Viable Campaign program can not guarantee you victory at the ballot box. Much is left to what you do with that opportunity, how effectively you apply what you learn, the opposition you face, how well funded your opposition is and the temperament and preferences of the voters in your district. Our coaching is intended to position you and your politics in the best possible light for success in your district; to share with you the skills and strategies which can potentially overcome the power of corporate money financing your political opposition. But no program can offer a guarantee of victory at the ballot box. And we make no such claim that our program is any different in that respect.