Ron Paul Needs Your Voice in Kansas!

I'm so proud of you, guys. Please keep it up.
We need current, and past military personnel who can volunteer some of their time to speak in these caucuses.

"He who exercises government by means of his virtue may be compared to the north polar star, which keeps its place and all the stars turn towards it." Confucius

The one I was at in Council Bluffs...we had two precincts in the same location.
People where all sitting around in groups according to what candidate they where behind.
I was a little worried since we only had 6 people around our table...YIKES
Myself and another guy(he flew in from California just to speak
at the Caucus) milled around sharing about Ron Paul and passing out slim jims.
The guy from California and another gentlemen that was in the Army gave a speech for Ron Paul since
there was two precincts.
We ended up winning the one precinct and coming in second in the other one !!
I have no doubt their speeches made a HUGE difference.

We have 4 districts. I'm in district 3, which is basically Johnson, Wyandotte, and half of Douglas county. The caucus winner is determined by who gets the most votes statewide and will receive all 24 at large delegates . However, the winner must get first in two of the districts to get all of the 24 at-large delegates. Then, there are three district delegates per district that are selected by the state's party leadership. These delegates most likely will not go to Dr. Paul, so we have to win the at large delegates.

And here's an important point. Every one of us has to cure our apathy towards the political process and get involved. We are in this uphill battle now to get Ron Paul the nomination, because we were not involved in the years when we were only presented the lesser of evils as options. It's important to get involved, and the easiest way to do it is to try and become a precinct captain/committemember. These are the people that get together once every two years and elect the party leadership in your district and for your state. And, in many areas, the precinct committee spots often remain unfilled. A friend of mine was in an open precinct, met with a ward member and is now being appointed, effective immediately. So, he will be on the ballot as an incumbent in August. If you are unlucky enough to be opposed in your precinct like me, the precincts are usually small enough that you only need about 20 votes to win. I am pulling double duty here, because I am not only campaigning for Ron Paul but also for myself to be a committeeman.

Also, I applied to be a delegate to the convention in my state, and it is the party leadership that selects the delegates from those that applied. So, even if Ron Paul wins Kansas, the delegates are only duty bound to vote for him the first round of balloting. If the party leadership of Kansas stuffs the delegate slate with McCain or Romney supporters, then they are free to vote for them after the first round. So, that is another reason it is important to fill these committeeperson spots with the right people.

I can't do anything on the ground, but I can offer that you go to

http://www.thelibertyproject.com

and you can get people free bumper stickers. That would at least show others that there is Ron Paul support around them.

I was out walking my precinct in Kansas this weekend, but I'm in the 3rd district KC area. Most of the Kansans I talked to were very receptive to Dr. Paul's message. I walked over at least a 100 houses in my neighborhood and didn't have a single door slammed in my face.

BTW, the codes on the walking lists are amazingly accurate to what issues people care about, and that made it easy to strike up a conversation. Make sure you get the one for your area and go after the exclamation points. I found one house just down the street from me considered to be very influential, and they hadn't even heard of Ron Paul. When I talked to them, they sounded pretty interested in what I was telling them.

Unfortunately, going door to door is very tedious. We really need to get others to sign on as precinct leaders to share the burden of canvassing. My area had 60 pages of registered voters, or about 600 households. I had a friend helping me, and it took us about 3 hours to walk only about a 1/6 of the precinct.

And out of 100 houses, I maybe found 3-5 people that may caucus for Dr. Paul. I made sure to keep good notes, so I could call those people back as it gets closer.

Also, one technique I found that worked pretty well was introducing myself as someone that lived in neighborhood. I think that identifying myself as their neighbors helped them be more receptive to the message.

Another tactic that I used was not to ask if they were going to the caucus, but rather if they planned on voting in November. Our state has not had a caucus since 1988, so a good majority of the state's citizens may not even know we're having one this year. I wanted to make sure I wasn't helping people vote if it was going to be for someone else.

Also, I went to every house, not just those identified as Republican. I found a few Dem households that were very receptive to Dr. Paul, and at least 3 that said they'd vote for him if he was the nominee. I was able to give literature to some Dems that said they would pass it on to their Republican friends. I also told Democrats how to vote in their caucus on the 5th, because I think that fostered additional goodwill amongst them.

But, now I only have one weekend to go to reach the rest of the houses in my precinct, and it's unfortunately Super Bowl weekend, so Sunday afternoon will be difficult.

At this point, I think I am going to get a ton of clear plastic bags to hang on doors and will probably only try to knock on those that are considered influential. I'm thinking I can spend all day Saturday walking the neighborhood and just stick fliers on the door. Unfortunately, it is very tough to then know how those people might vote, so VoterID is really tough.