[Pnp-wg] Introduction, announcements, and (proposed) organization

[Gary R. Hecker]

Hey, All. This is Gary Hecker, from Florida. I'm a Co-Chair of my Local, and
also State. I'm a CC member, and sit on the Dispute Resolution and Platform
Committees. I've been a Green since 2000, but voted Green in 96. I attended
Milwaukee.

I concur with Steve's suggestions. Whether we call them facilitators or
co-chairs, I think we need to have someone keeping our focus. This is going
to be a difficult, contentious process, as if we didn't already know.

I would also suggest that each member gather lists of what their state
delegates liked, annd disliked about the Milwaukee convention, whether
substantiated or not. My view of this process would result in absolute
clarity for all future nominating delegates that the results are
transparent, fair, and representative of the wishes of individual Greens.

Gary Hecker
Florida

> From: Steve Kramer <scooter@guisarme.net>
> Date: Wed, 23 Feb 2005 00:04:12 -0500 (EST)
> To: pnp-wg@gp-us.org
> Subject: [Pnp-wg] Introduction, announcements, and (proposed) organization
> 
> First of all, I would like to introduce myself.  I'm Steve Kramer of
> Columbia, Maryland, a Green since only 2001, I'm afraid (previously
> unaffiliated/Independent)!  I'm former Coordinator of the Howard County
> Green Party, the current GPUS Delegate from Maryland, a former member of
> the GPUS Dispute Resolution Committee, and an assistant in the founding of
> the West Virginia Green Party.  I have been campaign manager for Lise
> Mendel for Howard County Board of Education (2004) and Maryland's field
> coordinator for the Cobb/LaMarche campaign, also in 2004.  I have
> represented the Green Party to local Muslim organizations in the Baltimore
> and D.C. areas, and to the Howard County Coalition for Peace and Justice.
> I am the founding member of the Fellowship of Christian Greens, a member
> of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee for Central Maryland, and an
> applicant member of Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility.  I'd
> like to thank everyone for allowing me the opportunity to serve as
> Maryland's representative to this Working Group - and ask everyone's
> forgiveness for being so longwinded.
> 
> The Maryland Green Party is keeping a close eye on our democratic process,
> across the spectrum.  I think it's an important quality for us to
> cultivate, because it differentiates us so strongly from the "major"
> political parties in this country.  One of our Baltimore County Greens,
> Dick Ochs <rjochs@comcast.net>, is convening a meeting on the democratic
> process in the MGP and GPUS in Baltimore on March 6th at noon.  The
> specific location has yet to be announced, and I will be slightly late
> because I'll be coming from church, but I will be there, and will convey
> our findings to this WG.  Dick hasn't responded to my question as to
> whether others are invited, but I honestly don't see him saying no, so I'm
> making this a general announcement, and I will keep everyone informed as
> to the venue.
> 
> So far, we've had some interesting proposals, and I must say that I
> appreciate the tone that they have been phrased in.  I think more than
> anything else, we must operate in a climate of mutual respect.  That's a
> very big point in our favor so far.  However, Greg had a good point in
> that we need to establish a few things before charging right ahead into
> strategies.  I'm not certain I agree with Greg that extensive fact-finding
> is necessary - a review of the Bylaws, Delegate Selection Process
> (Formula), and Floor Rules of the 2004 Convention should be all that is
> required, and that can be accomplished with an hour or so of Web
> searching.
> 
> I would instead like to suggest an overall process that we can follow.
> This is just a suggestion at this point, and I'm spelling it out here as
> something that we can begin kicking around as a precursor to consensus.
> 
> 1. Rules of conduct
> 
> First, we should choose a facilitator or facilitators, and agree on how we
> will discuss matters.  If we wish to form sub-groups or schedule
> discussions in some way other than this list, then we would do so in this
> phase.  We should choose who will speak for us, and under what
> circumstances (such as status reports), and what will constitute
> consensus.  I believe that we should choose a very few rules of discussion
> which are as open as possible, to allow for the broadest expression of
> opinion.
> 
> 2. Statement of purpose
> 
> Second, I would like to ask that we draft a *short* statement of purpose
> and release it publicly.  This would be a very plain statement of what we
> will decide, and what we won't.  The actual decisions shouldn't be made at
> this time, nor should any strategies be discussed.
> 
> 3. Goals
> 
> I suggest that we then discuss what our goals are in the Presidential
> Nominating Process.  I think this is the big discussion that we didn't
> have before, and perhaps should have - we developed different strategies
> because we were working toward different goals!  I would like to see this
> be a "brainstorming" session; there should be **no wrong answers** at this
> time!  Everything should be written down, and everything should be
> considered.
> 
> 4. Priorities
> 
> In this stage, I suggest that we decide what goals are most important to
> us, and which should take priority over the other.  Again, I believe we
> should avoid labeling a goal as "wrong", but instead advocate why a
> different goal should have priority.  We should think of priorities in
> terms of essential (as in, we could not proceed at all without this goal
> in mind), important, preferable, or incidental - or some similar fashion.
> By the end of this phase, we should have an ordered (or nearly so) list of
> priorities.
> 
> 5. Strategies
> 
> Now, we get to the nitty-gritty, and discuss specific voting methods,
> consensus methods, polling methods, vote-counting techniques, and the like
> to meet our priorities.  Discussion should center around how the strategy
> addresses that list that we spelled out in the last phase - starting with
> the most important goals first.
> 
> 6. Final report
> 
> At the end, we produce a report, review it, and publish it.  Significant
> minority views should be included, and we may wish to have a session on
> how to incorporate some of those views in the final recommended methods,
> in keeping with Green consensus.
> 
> Again, this is not set in stone!  These are just my ideas on how we might
> go about conducting our business.  I'd like to hear any comments or
> questions on them.
> 
> -- 
> Steve Kramer           ||         scooter (at) guisarme dot net         ||
> _____________________  ===================================================
> |  __/^\__        ,-^,|   "The white man says there is freedom and justice
> |/~       \_     {  / |     for all.  We have had 'freedom' and 'justice',
> \/\   |!  |   and that is why we have been almost exterminated.
> /  / )  |___           We shall not forget this."
> (_  \ \     /
> ~v^  ?_,-'  from the 1927 Grand Council of American Indians
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