Fwd: From Ellen Johnson
Subject: Fwd: From Ellen Johnson
From: Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com>
Date: 10/6/10, 21:23
To: Robert Green <robertogreen@gmail.com>

Here's a discussion I'm having with the campaign manager, to whom I mentioned the idea about doing a video, among other things as seen below his most recent response. I've gotten a bunch of Project PM people mobilized on this along with some other contacts who run organizations of their own and will basically be concentrating on assisting the campaign up until the election, sending out appeals to various contacts and composing a strategy by which to get this guy the funds and volunteers he needs to pull this off. If we can get this guy in, Project PM would be able to suggest all manner of wonkish policy implementations  of the sort that would be extraordinarily useful to this nation but which never get a hearing in Congress. There are also a number of ways to mobilize the "internet culture" behind this guy by correctly portraying him as someone who's going to maintain a constant back-and-forth with such media as reddit and thereby have access to a distributed group of advisors capable of giving erudite and wonkish suggestions on any number of subjects. Antonio also seems receptive to this line of thought; I'll discuss this with him tomorrow when we have the phone conference. Let me know if you have any other thoughts at this point.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Antonio M. Elias <Antonio@legrowforuscongress.com>
Date: Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 9:02 PM
Subject: Re: From Ellen Johnson
To: Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com>


I know I've mentioned net neutrality to Wynne.  He's not exactly the techiest guy and likely does not remember what it is, but I will make sure he's in favor!  It's a pretty big deal.

I've heard so much about reddit but have never used it myself - please use it to it's full capacity to publicize our campaign!  I'll give you a heads up if there's anything else we could put up there.

Regarding the video - I'd love to hear what ideas you have.  We have a decent camera and a tripod over at the office.  Only problem - between you and me, Wynne is absolutely terrible in front of a camera.  Just, abysmal really.  He did a bit for a local station with the help of a teleprompter that worked out fine, but every time we try to do something in the office it looks like a Taliban hostage tape.  Wynne was a doctor for over 30 years - he certainly knows how to interact with people, it's just the camera that makes it difficult for some reason.  If we could put together something that involves other people besides Wynne, that might work.  Also - I'm sure a producer in LA has plenty of connections, but if we need a free editor, Wynne's son is an editor there - Vince LeGrow.

I'm going to be in our Petersburg office tomorrow and Wynne is in Emporia.  If possible I'll try to make it a conference call just so I can get to talk to you as well.

This sounds like fun - I'm looking forward to getting the word out nationally,

-Antonio


On Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 8:38 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi, Antonio-

Thanks for getting back to me. 

1. I agree with you regarding atheism not being an inherent reason to vote for someone, and though I tried to emphasize in this first article that this election is important for a variety of reasons, I'll make sure to more explicitly make the case for Wynne on the basis of policy going forward; my conversation with him tomorrow should help, as I'll be asking him a number of policy-related questions.
2. Some pictures would be great; send them along whenever.
3. I'll make sure to link to the proper URL.
4. Speaking of policy, has Wynne come out in favor of Net Neutrality? If he makes a point of doing so, I'll be able to push for him on a wider variety of channels, Net Neutrality being among the most universal concerns of those who know what it is. This would not necessarily bag him many votes on its own, but it would prompt a number of people to donate and otherwise spread the word about the campaign across various internet venues. It's also one of the great unsung issues of our age. If he hasn't familiarized himself with the subject, have him do so.
5. As for Forbes, I've begun opposition research today and have some of my Project PM people doing so as well. I'll use this for future writings and will also provide you with periodic rundowns for the campaign to use as needed.
6. I see that Neal has gotten in touch with you; he has his own organization separate from mine that will no doubt prove useful to you, and my people are now coordinating with his on getting the word out. One of my guys, Tim Ellis, also writes for HuffPo; I'll get him started on this later this evening, along with a few others who have their own blogs. 
7. I've sent out an e-mail based on today's post to Robert Green, a producer out in California with whom I'm working on some projects and who has quite a few contacts who are wealthy Democrats with plenty of their own contacts; he's agreed to forward it on to the relevant people, so hopefully you'll start seeing some donations from California in the near future. He also mentioned to me the possibility of doing a video for distribution on YouTube and other platforms based on a script I'd compose for the purpose. Let me know if you'd like me to get you two in touch so you can discuss it directly.
8. I don't know how familiar you are with reddit, but it's unparalleled as a tool for reaching large numbers of intelligent people at once. If you'd like, I can handle all of your redditing for you; simply send me the URL for anything that you'd like to be seen, and I'll put it up and compose a headline in such a way that it'll get positive attention. For instance, I submitted the Daily Kos piece to reddit's atheism channel and it's number 2 on the page, which itself has over 90,000 subscribers and some unknown additional number of people who just check in on it, and so without spending a dime, we've gotten LeGrow's campaign brought to the attention of at least 10,000 members of a demographic that is exceptionally likely to donate to him or spread the word further. Reddit is also popular among bloggers and other media professionals, which is why something that appears there on one day will often appear on, say, Andrew Sullivan's blog three days later. Of course, this doesn't necessarily translate to donations, but we'll see.

That's it for now; get back to me when you have a moment and we'll figure out what else can be done at this point and perhaps start on this video idea that Green mentioned.

On Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 6:33 PM, Antonio M. Elias <Antonio@legrowforuscongress.com> wrote:
Barrett,

That's a great narrative.  A few things:

  • The last time Wynne made a post on Daily Kos "coming out" as an atheist, a few people said "so what?" and a lot of people claimed to be offended because they think it's just as bad to support someone for being an atheist as it is to support them for being Christian.  I agree with them for the most part (though a small part of me believes in identity politics - just as there should be Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians, and men and women in Congress - there should be an atheist to represent that 10% of the population).  That aside - they have a point - and that was - what are Wynne's views on the big issues?  I direct them both to the issues page of our web site, along with this post by Wynne: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/7/1/880876/-A-Progressive-Democrat-for-Southside-Virginia - we want to stress, especially in the Daily Kos community, that Wynne is, personally and politically, a progressive.  He's not a fringe candidate either - he knows that there are completely feasible, progressive solutions to problems such as climate change, the deficit, education, jobs, etc.
  • The tag at the bottom says "LaGrow" instead of "LeGrow".  Just a typo I noticed.  I know the important tag is "VA-04"
  • Let me know if you want any pictures of Wynne/the campaign
  • I don't think you've ever done this, but if you and your friends are going to be covering our race, make sure you always list our website as "legrowforuscongress.com" - a lot of people leave out the "us" - "legrowforcongress.com" does not exist unfortunately, we think someone else must have snatched it up early, but we don't know who
  • Another fun tidbit: if anyone pulls out the "Southern Virginians are intolerant Conservatives - they'd never elect a Democrat or a non-Christian" line - just let them know that Randy Forbes was preceded by Norman Sisisky - a Jewish Democrat who represented the 4th for 18 years.  He was quite popular.
We don't want to hold back any punches here.  Randy Forbes is a theocrat - that's a fact.  If you really want to vomit/get some good material, take a look at this speech he made: http://www.votesmart.org/speech_detail.php?sc_id=382554&keyword=&phrase=&contain=  Wynne is by no means anti-Christian or anti-religion - he's just a strong supporter of our Constitutional rights!  This is the start of a great movement but it's not just for atheists - I for one am a secular Christian - I'm a Christian personally, but we live in a secular country and I want to keep it that way.  My still-devout Catholic parents who came here from Southwestern Europe where (when they were growing up) the government all but told them how to worship would fully agree.

I'm really looking forward to this extra attention - it is exactly what we need right now.  Ideally we'll get front-page on big national blogs - it seems the "holy grail" (pardon the pun) of atheist blogs is Pharyngula - but we haven't made any inroads with Professor Myers there.  TV - MSNBC, Daily Show, etc would be truly extraordinary, but we're not holding our breath.

Let me know what else you need and keep me in the loop on other posts you or others make.

Thank you so much,

-Antonio


On Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 5:32 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Here's a post that I just wrote on LeGrow which I'm also placing on various other venues where it will widely seen by potential volunteers and donors; let me know what you think of it, as I plan to use most of it in the e-mail I'll be sending out; Robert Green, a producer out in LA whom I've been working with, has agreed to send the  appeal along to his many wealthy contacts who routinely contribute to candidates.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/10/6/908238/-VA-4:-The-Most-Important-Race-You-Havent-Heard-Of


On Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 1:55 PM, barri2009 <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Also, I want to emphasize to potential donors how far there money will go in a race like this; can you give me an idea of what 500 can buy in terms of radio spots, etc?

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

From: "Antonio M. Elias" <Antonio@legrowforuscongress.com>
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2010 13:29:13 -0400
To: Barrett Brown<barriticus@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: From Ellen Johnson

Barrett,

We have one phone interview with local press tomorrow morning at 11 AM - so to give enough time for both you can call in either at 10 AM or around noon tomorrow - whichever works better for you.

Wynne will be at our main office in Emporia and the number there is: 434.348.1077.

Let me know which time is better for you (if you are free tomorrow) and I will pass it along to Wynne.

-Antonio

On Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 1:02 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Antonio-

I'm about to get started on all of this; let's set up a time for me to interview LeGrow over the phone, preferably soon so that I can use that content for my e-mails to potential donors and articles for my various outlets. Let me know what time would work for him. I'm at 512-560-2302.


On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 5:34 PM, Antonio M. Elias <Antonio@legrowforuscongress.com> wrote:
Barrett,

It would be great if you could spread the word about Wynne that way and encourage people to help out the campaign by contributing or signing up to volunteer (people can phone bank from anywhere there's a phone and a computer!).

Wynne has already had a little bit of attention from national (non-mainstream) media:

Interview with Freedom From Religion Radio: http://ffrf.libsyn.com/guest_wynne_legrow_m_d_atheist_congressional_candidate_and_cartoonist_steve_benson

Wynne's "coming out" article on Daily Kos (which became a "high impact" diary): http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/8/18/894365/-An-Atheist-Running-for-Congress

On Friendly Atheist: http://friendlyatheist.com/2010/08/21/an-atheist-is-running-for-congress-in-virginia/

You can draw from those, or if you need any new material, feel free to get in touch with me.  If you'd like to interview Wynne over the phone, he'd be glad to do that..

This is our website where people can contribute or sign up to volunteer:

http://www.legrowforuscongress.com/

This is our contribution link:

https://services.myngp.com/ngponlineservices/contribution.aspx?X=GEH5jOZ/5ax6OzTRwNUk1hudqu1yXCEN1L1I8jV/mF4=

If you end up writing pieces that are less opinion and more news (i.e. - wouldn't include a push for people to contribute), we'd love to see that too.

We're happy to have you on our side.  Thanks for volunteering, and we'll let you know if there is any communications work we could use your help on,

-Antonio



On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 1:59 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Antonio-

This is Barrett Brown; I serve as director of communications for Enlighten the Vote as well as director of the media reform organization Project PM. I'm also a contributor to Vanity Fair, Huffington Post, Skeptical Inquirer, and a variety of other outlets, and I'm the author of a book on the duplicity of the intelligent design movement.

With your permission, I'm going to go ahead and write up a short piece on why it's necessary for reasonable people to support Wynn with financial contributions, which I'll run on Daily Kos, HuffPo, reddit.com, and some other outlets; if you send me a link to your site for online donations, I'll include that too. I would expect that this would generate at least a few hundred dollars for your campaign, if not more.

I'd also like to offer my services as a writer and experienced online activist; let me know if there's anything I can do for you in those capacities.


On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 12:47 PM, Antonio M. Elias <Antonio@legrowforuscongress.com> wrote:
Ellen,

First of all - thank you for everything you and your group has already done.  Frankly, the alternative to having a fledgling group like Enlighten the Vote would be having no group at all.  Every movement has to start somewhere, and Wynne and I are both very glad to have you around.

Regarding fundraising - it's difficult!  I devote my career to it and no matter how much work you put into an operation, it takes two elements that are out of our control: time and luck.  Fortune is certainly not on our side.  With the economy still less-than-stellar and liberals feeling down, we too are having difficulty raising money.  That said, it's perseverance that is keeping our head above the water.  The last person to run against Randy Forbes had to fire her campaign staff and went into the red.  Thank goodness we're not there.

We have raised a bit of money from Atheists across the country, but not as much as either of us may prefer.  Any further financial support that Enlighten the Vote can provide is crucial.  If you can mail just one check of $1500 or $2000 in the next two weeks, that would make a huge dent in our budget and it would seriously show Randy Forbes that our community means business when that amount shows up on our public finance reports. 

I've been meaning to give you a general update on the campaign - things have really been heating up, especially on the front of religion.  Within days of each other the two major papers in the district (Richmond Times Dispatch and Hampton Roads Virginian-Pilot) ran front-page article on the race.  The Times-Dispatch led with Wynne's lack of religion and then moved on to other topics, while the Pilot ran a 1700-word, weekend edition section entirely on the subject of religion (and the stark contrast between Wynne and Randy).

The "fallout" from this has been truly fascinating to observe and take part in.  First of all - the response was nearly unanimous that both papers did a disservice to voters by playing into the notion that a candidate's religious views are a serious policy issue.  We have not heard a single voice on either side say that those articles were justified.

Secondly - a lot of people have rushed to our defense for a variety of reasons: Christians saying it's not a big deal and that other issues matter more, Atheists commending Wynne for his courage, and both simply rallying behind the separation of Church and State against the theocrat Randy Forbes.

Within our own support base we have had only two instances of "dissent" due to the articles.  One was an 87-year-old African American minister and staunch Democrat in Chesapeake who was quoted in the paper as saying "I could not vote for a man who doesn't believe in some power higher than his".  Wynne phoned and then met with the Reverend.  By the end of the meeting he was totally on our side and said "we have to get this man elected!"

One of our local Democratic committees raised a slight fuss over the issue.  Apparently the group is comprised entirely of regular churchgoers and even some ministers.  We simply explained to them that "atheist" does not mean that Wynne is against religion, just that Wynne himself is not a believer in God, though he fully embraces human morality and ethics.  The committee understood the difference and is volunteering for us as I write this email.

For your reference, here are some of the articles and responses in the paper lately:

http://hamptonroads.com/2010/09/forbes-versus-legrow-god-only-one-trusts (the Hampton Roads article)

http://hamptonroads.com/2010/09/atheism-not-issue?cid=srch (a letter to the editor response)

http://hamptonroads.com/2010/09/pilots-bias-showing?cid=srch (another letter to the editor)

http://hamptonroads.com/2010/10/govern-dont-preach (a final letter from a former Forbes supporter)

http://hamptonroads.com/2010/10/govern-dont-preach (the Richmond article)

Going back to how you can help us.  Don't worry about more fundraising emails for now.  Maybe one at the last minute that would direct people to contribute to us would help.  For now - If you can get the word out to your membership by blast emails and phone calls to sign up for our campaign emails - that would be excellent.  That way we can keep in touch with them directly.  You cannot legally share your list with us, but you can encourage people to go to our main website and click "join our email list" - or you can give them this link directly.:

https://services.myngp.com/ngponlineservices/EmailSignup.aspx?X=Wg/L8xot3UM=

Again, whatever you have on-hand in the PAC account, if you can write us a $1500, $2000, or $2500 check, that would be a huge help (our mailing address is: PO Box 92, Emporia, VA 23847)

Any publicity you can give us across the country by recommending papers, bloggers, or other media to cover this story is a big help.  I for one was not surprised at all that those stories came out in the local papers - the media likes a juicy story, and we're giving them one!

The fact is that this district is not overwhelmingly Republican.  If it were, Obama would not have won here in 2008, which he did.  It is very Christian, yes, but as I explained - we've gotten far more positive responses than negative ones (I'm sure there are plenty of people upset by Wynne's lack of faith, but they were likely going to vote for Forbes anyways).  I believe that this, along with atheists running for local office, is a great start.

Thank you for your continued support.  I know you're putting a great deal of effort into this Ellen and I don't want to take it for granted.

-Antonio

PS - attached is a picture from our recent fundraiser.


On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 11:38 AM, <elljhns8@aol.com> wrote:
Hi Antonio,

      So far we have issued three fundraising appeals for Dr. LeGrow.  The donations have trickled off.  In all, we have barely raised $1,000.  Maybe people donated directly to your site.  Do you know if anyone donated directly to  you because of our appeals?  I hope so. 

I contacted an Atheist activist in Virginia to help.  He forwarded our EV appeals.  In fact, many people have forwarded our appeals.  I will contact him again and see if he can get some people to your office to volunteer.

  I recently spoke to local Atheist groups in Pennsylvania and New Orleans and spoke at length about the need to support Dr. LeGrow.  I brought home $200.  
     Atheists are not political.  They don't think that way because no one has ever made that an important issue for them except us. A lot of that has to do with the fact that they are non-profit organizations and so they instinctively avoid politics.  
       They do agree with what I say, and they actually run for office at the local level, so I know that we are on the right track and we need to continue what we are doing.  I am going to continue to travel around the country, as much as I can, to speak directly to Atheists and lead our movement towards a political future.  

     I don't know what else to do for Dr. LeGrow.  I'll issue more appeals. The common political wisdom is that it is easier to get people to vote against something than in favor of something. That is why is targeted the fundraisers against Randy Forbes rather than for Dr. LeGrow.  

    I know that your campaign is in an overwhelmingly Republican district.  But I think that it is very important for Atheists to try very hard anyway to show that we care.  We need to at least demonstrate that we as a movement have a pulse.  

   I will keep working hard for your campaign until Election Day Antonio.  

   How is it looking on your end?  

Regards,

Ellen



      



--
Antonio M. Elias
Campaign Manager
LeGrow for Congress
www.legrowforuscongress.com
o.: 434.348.1077
c.: 571.274.9840




--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302



--
Antonio M. Elias
Campaign Manager
LeGrow for Congress
www.legrowforuscongress.com
o.: 434.348.1077
c.: 571.274.9840




--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302



--
Antonio M. Elias
Campaign Manager
LeGrow for Congress
www.legrowforuscongress.com
o.: 434.348.1077
c.: 571.274.9840




--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302



--
Antonio M. Elias
Campaign Manager
LeGrow for Congress
www.legrowforuscongress.com
o.: 434.348.1077
c.: 571.274.9840




--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302



--
Antonio M. Elias
Campaign Manager
LeGrow for Congress
www.legrowforuscongress.com
o.: 434.348.1077
c.: 571.274.9840




--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302