My Political Spending History

Saturday's ExCom meeting of the financially troubled LPCA is sure to bring renewed pressure on ExCom members and deep-pocket prospective donors, of which I am both. I note again that I'm the one candidate for LPCA internal office who campaigned on a theme of matching our finance structure to our cost structure (like real enterprises do):

We shouldn't need to be to be doing heavy generic LPCA fundraising if we have the right dues model and engage in projects that are either self-financing (from incremental project-specific fundraising) or are cheap (e.g. due to use of information technology). Aside from money for specific projects, we should more often being asking our members for their time (e.g. in outreach efforts) than their money.

For reference purposes, here is my non-LPCA-related political spending history:

• 1980? - I may have sent like $20-$50 to Reagan, but I'm not sure.
  
• 1995 Oct 12 - When Arlan Specter was the lone socially-tolerant candidate for the GOP nomination, I donated $250 to him.
• 1999 Oct - I sent Gov. Jesse Ventura $50 when he told Playboy "Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers."
• 2000 - I paid $1000 for a life LP membership in 2000 or 2001.
• 2000 Nov - I donated $250 to Tom Campbell's Senate race.
  
• 2001 Aug - I paid $175 for a voter guide statement in my race for San Carlos School Board.
• 2002 - I'm pretty sure I donated a couple hundred bucks to Rep. Ron Paul, but haven't dug up the records to confirm it.
  
• 2004 - I gave $500 to liberal Republican Steve Poizner's campaign for CA Assembly.
• 2004 June - I gave $500 to Michael Badnarik's presidential campaign.
• 2004 Oct - FEC records say I donated $1000 to the LPUS.
  
• 2005 Nov - I donated $500 to Michael Badnarik's congressional campaign.
  
• 2006 Jan - I donated $750 to the LPUS to help finance that lame Penn Jillette LP-promoting video clip eventually shown at the Portland convention.
• 2006 Jun - FEC records say I donated $399 to the LPUS.
  

And here is my LPCA-related political spending history:

• 2004 - I spent $629 in filing fees so that Libertarians in CA-14 would have a candidate for Congress (me).
• 2004 Nov - I donated $800 to finance sending the LPSM election newsletter to all reglibs in the county.
• 2005 Jun - I donated $300 to Richard Rider's campaign for mayor of San Diego.
  
• 2005 Nov - I donated $936 to finance sending the LPSM election newsletter to all reglibs in the county.
• 2006 Mar - I spent $1000 in filing fees so that Libertarians in CA-14 would have a candidate for Congress (me).
• 2006 Mar - At the 2005 LPCA convention, Allen Rice ended a bitter fight over "floor fees" by donating $195 to cover unpaid fees. I paid him the $195 when he later complained about the controversy.
  
• 2006 May - I donated $500 to Bob Weber's write-in primary campaign, in an LPCA effort to create a test case by which to challenge an election law and make it easier to get Libertarians into general elections.
• 2007 Apr - I donated $200 to the LPCA convention for permission to email all the delegates regarding my race for ExCom.
  
• 2007 Sep - I donated $200 to the LPCA pursuant to the 2006 Operation Breakthrough.
  

Thus, not counting a couple grand in travel-related expenses, I've given over $4700 to LPCA-related causes over the last four years, and a total of over $7000 to Libertarian causes since becoming an LP activist in 1999. In addition, I tried to give away $4000 in an LP-related essay contest but got no takers, and tried to give away $1000/yr in bounties for LPCA activism but got effectively no response. (I won't count the various times I've issued challenges that if met would require me to donate to the LP, since in most cases the challenges are designed to prove that the challengee is not serious about the challenged position.) I remain open to helping finance projects I believe are worthy, but I'm not going to be an enabler of the LPCA's broken financial model by handing over (or raising) cash to finance basic party operations -- like our anti-war-obsessed anti-reformist newsletter. Besides, I'm sure the new editorial slant of California Freedom has unleashed a flood of donations that were being withheld back when CF didn't take sides on the major internal LP schisms...