Reports from the Front Line: Pennsylvania Republican Primary

We started out from the gates from July.of last year intill the primary with planting all different sizes of Ron paul sign's....Every saturday a 7 hour sign waving day with different issue signs,and passing out slim jims and dvd's...Plus the good old fashion door to door visit's and phone calls..We also had a big Ron Paul funraising event for our delegates.

"Observe the masses,and do the opposite."

We spent the last week "painting the town paul" around Pgh City and it was worth it! We made tons of calls for delegates, and informed citizens that Ron Paul was still in the race. All this was done 100% by volunteers and we got a higher % than any other state.

Also, a quick congrats to Robert Tamburo who will be going as a delegate to the national convention!

Possible advice to the next states in the primary:
Get republican calling lists and call all the people you can to let them know that Ron Paul is still in the race and inform them of what delegates they can vote for in the primary (depending on their district), given citizens can vote for delegates in your primary (each state is different). Most of the time, no one pays much attention to delegates. They just want names and a quick description of why that delegate is a good choice.

What we did in PA which worked out well is called people and didn't always link the delegates to Paul. On answering machines we often left something along the lines of, "I'm calling to remind you that the primaries are coming up on [date]
and encourage you to vote for the delegates that have sworn to uphold the constitution, etc...so in addition to your choice between Ron Paul and John McCain for the presidential nomination please remember to vote for these delegates [delegate names]. Please jot down their names so you don't forget and take them with you when you vote on [date of primary]".
This way you are letting people know that Ron Paul is still in the race and you are letting them know about the delegates and giving them a good reason to vote for them. Also, you are not associating the delegates with paul in case the voters support McCain and vote for someone else to spite him. If someone does in fact say they will vote for Dr. Paul, by all means specify about his delegates!
I realize that sometimes delegates are bound, and some states don't vote for them in the primary. Look this info up and see what your situation is!

Another important thing to do, which we could have used more of, is have volunteers at the polling locations on election day. I realize this is hard if the primary is on a weekday but it is very crucial, especially for the delegate votes. Creating simple pamplets/fliers for the delegates and having volunteers organized to hand them out at high turn out poll locations is your key to getting those delegate votes (if this applies to you)! Get to the polls for your primaries and it will make a difference.
If not useful for delegates it will still make an impact with voters when it comes to Ron Paul!

Lastly, regardless of your delegate situation, is the signs. Go around the night before and put as many signs as possible at all the known polling locations (you can find them online) and get directions. Get a group and split up and go around to different districts, areas, etc and get those polls covered. If you do that people voting at those polls will know Paul is still in the race do to the signs placed there. In PA Huckabee was still on the ballot but there were no signs for him at the poll locations. If signs are at the polls everywhere that helps indicate a person is still running.

Hope this helps! Good luck in your primaries!

I worked the polls at Holmesburg rec center (District 13) from 5 - 8 pm. Initially the Democrat union guys seemed to not want me around, and tried to tell me to hit up other polling stations that supposedly had more registered Republicans.

I was surprised at how many voters admitted to being Republicans (Philly is a Democrat heavy city and it's a Democrat year), and they were all very pleased to get the delegate handout I had. The layout and concept was certainly revolutionary for Philly politics. Pictures of the delegates with four information blurbs on each. It probably inspired many votes. I know I typically ignore the cruddy candidate slate sheets that poll workers hand out. They tell you nothing about the people, you know they are just party endorsed and we are expected to be good soldiers and vote without thinking? I'm sure many people were just glad their intelligence was recognized.

Eventually the Democratic workers warmed up to me and I learned a lot about our political system from them. Very worthwhile. The Republican party is quite dead within Philly, and we could very easily take it over and infuse it with Paulian politics.

Some fun moments, a young kid about 11 spit on the sidewalk near us and the Democrat workers told him politely to not do that, and jokingly said it's "a 20 dollar fine". I walked to the kid, handed him our delegate sheet, and said "Become a Republican kid, we support your right to spit." The Dems found it hilarious, it was a good time. Also I hit up a couple other nearby polls briefly to check out the action, and their was another Republican poll worker at one of them. This old women was sitting on her hands with her literature, doing nothing. I didn't know who she was until the Democrats pointed her out to me, apparently she was with the Republican Party of Philly. She was timid and uninspired to say the least, just their to collect a paycheck no doubt. We can trounce these people. She was nervous by my presence apparently presuming I was with the party as well and that I was their checking up on her incompetence. She recommended other polls to hit but I just went back to the Rec. I also gave a couple older ladies (one who was disabled) a ride from one polling station to another nearby because they couldn't walk it and got to make my Ron Paul pitch to them (I'm sure my do gooding will reflect well on him and possibly inspire an interest).

Overall a great few hours, next time I will pull an all day shift.

Well, I got lost and went to the wrong building but when I finally did get there (my first time voting, plus I am new to the town) there were two women and one man working the polls, and two women voting democrat. One of the women started extolling those stupid diebold machines, saying how convenient they are and that the paper ballots were a pain in the a**.

*sigh*

Finally it was my turn to vote. I think I wrote myself in about eight times lol. The choices for the local and state politicians were deplorable, quite frankly and I wasn't about to vote for the lesser of two or so evils. It was pretty sweet that Ron Paul was the first political candidate I've ever voted for, and I didn't have to hold my nose while doing it!

Ron Paul was beating McCain 5 to 1 in PA. Then mysteriously, he began losing votes...

VOTE COUNT FRAUD in PA - Armstrong County in Pennsylvania: Ron Paul was at 71% in Armstrong County, then mysteriously lost 114 votes and went down to 15%.

Vote tally with 13% reporting:
McCain - 118
Paul - 524

Vote tally with 48% reporting:
McCain - 2,063
Paul - 409

Wow. How does a candidate lose votes?

[NOTE: Thanks to the person on this post who reported this yesterday!]

My husband worked the polls all day, I was there when I wasn't working. Unfortunately, we came in 4th and 5th, the winning top three spots going to longtime politicianss. One RP supporter won an alternate delegate spot. And a few dems wrote in RP. Several people requested campaign materials and I gave away a few signs and limited edition buttons

The people at the polling station were very gracious and accommodating, I have lived here most of my life and knew many, or they knew my family. When one mentioned that she was a patient of mine, one of the old guys asked me if I was a nurse. When I said, "No, I'm a doctor," (chauvinism is alive and well in this small town) he became very nice and bent over backwards to be helpful to make up for his faux pas.

We were allowed to watch as they downloaded the results. My husband and I were both surprised at how long it took the machines to register the results. Even with my super slow computer, I could have downloaded the trivial amount of data in less than the five minutes or so it took the voting machines to do it. Curious.

I was at a precinct near West Chester whenever I could get the chance -- before work, during lunch, late afternoon (before my daughter's softball game) and after 7:30 (after my son's little league game). I'm a single dad, but I did what I could.
Two Rep. party committee people were inside at a table with their sample ballots, but they weren't handing them out, they were just sitting there. After hearing what happened in Delaware County, I decided to fly under the radar and hand out the delegate sample ballots outside the door. Later in the afternoon, two Rep. party folks were talking outside (I had given one of them a sample ballot thinking he was going to vote). The guy from the inside table told him that he saw about five Republican voters all day up till then. Either he was being sarcastic or he was asleep at the wheel, because I handed out around 50 sample Rep. ballots over the time I was there.
I could hear them trying to figure out what to make of me. "Maybe he's a Huckabee supporter, or for that other guy, umm, Ron Paul." But to my surprise, they never approached me.
At 8 PM, the old Rep. committee guy gathered up the McCain and other signs he had posted along the driveway. He put them in his car and walked by me with the RP sign I posted. "Here's a relic from the past," he said to me. I think he wanted to see if I would claim it. Being in stealth mode, I just responded, "Yeah, how about that."
Imagine, a old McCain supporter calling Ron Paul a relic from the past. :-)
I'm hoping that we get at least one out of every three delegates in PA. Then we'll make an awesome showing at the convention. I definitely think that our next move should be to get more of a presence within the Rep. party. Then we can sit at the inside table!
Brian

I just wonder why almost 600,000 people would go out to vote for Mccain when they think he is already the nominee?!?!

Does this seem strange to anyone else, or am I missing something.

that there are at least 545,000 sheeple in Pa. that don't mind being told they have no choice. To see the Keystone State reduced to this is an affront to all our forefathers that have sacrificed fortunes and lives to promote the very ideals that these jackasses don't think twice about relinquishing. We really have an uphill battle folks and must step up the efforts to expose this farce and make these idiots realize just how close to collapse this noble experiment in freedom is.

Again, many thanks to our fine Pennsylvania patriots for their hard work.

This song is for you.

http://www.youtube.com/wa...

Ok, so I'm dog tired...but I had to tell my tale...hahahaha
I worked my hometown polling place. We had a total of 668 voters today, 220ish were Republican. I don't know about the rest of the district...but at this poll we took 2 out of 3 delegates and 2 out of 3 alternates...so I'm feeling pretty good =) I did NOT have any trouble handing out ballots or anything...infact I was encouraged to run for committee person. (unfortunately I don't live there anymore..but will be looking into it in my town) Anyway here was the absolute highlight of my day....

Back in Feb. I was working towards getting signatures to become a delegate myself. As fate would have it my children got major sick during those two weeks so I fell 10 signatures short of the 250. But, while out in my hometown collecting signatures I met this elderly woman who was a McCain supporter. We talked and she admitted to not knowing about Dr. Paul. She was extremely Pro-life so she wasn't overly happy with McCain. I left her Dr. Paul's name and she was so intrigued that she had her Grandson bring her to the library so she could look Dr. Paul up on the computer. Since I was confident that I was going to get all my signatures (and I know I would have too ;p but that's another story) I had told her that I would be at the polling place in April.

Well...today she came up on her mobility scooter and sought me out. The other elderly ladies working the poll couldn't believe it because they know how hard it is for her to get around. She found me and in the unabashed way that only the elderly seem to possess..she said in her loudest voice how she was there to vote for me as a Ron Paul delegate...after explaining that I didn't make it but was there to promote other good Ron Paul folks she again made a big deal of telling everyone that if I thought they were good people then that was good enough for her. Even when the local GOP tried to hand her their ballot..she refused and told them she'd already gotten what she needed.
It will be one of those precious memories for me...pretty much for forever. I gave her a big hug before she left and for about an hour after that everyone was seriously nicer to me =)

Ran for committee person in my precinct (Marple Twp. in Delaware county, Ward 4, Precinct 2). We had sample ballots with our RP delegates on the back for each precinct where we had commitee people candidates (7 total wards, and three precincts per ward I think). The Delaware Co. Republican machine decided to strong-arm a judge into signing a court order declaring our handouts illegal, all done yesterday afternoon. Some in our RP meetup found out about this last night, but I found out around 8 this morning when constables served the court order to us and confiscated our sample ballots. Our guys were hard at work already in court and we had our stuff back in around 2 hours. But it gets better; out of the 3 precincts in my polling place, the two voting machines where I was on the ballot malfunctioned. One apparently jammed early in the day (but we didn't find out until after polls closed) and the other spit out all sorts of extra tape but still reported results. the jammed one had one thick line of black where everything printed all bunched together. So that machine has to be examined. Wonderful, isn't it? The whole experience was absolutely disgusting. And I had to deal with my slick greasy commissioner all day... he was helping the competition and they were hanging out right in front of the door instead of 10 ft. away as they should have been. Didn't complain though b/c I wanted to keep them far away from me.

With no coverage of Dr. Paul's vote count in PA tonight, it looks like it will be up to us to pick up the phones and call as many national and local talk shows tomorrow to let others know how he did.

Let's see how many C-Span calls we can get in tomorrow!

Can't wait to see the delegate count.

It's late, I worked 10 hours passing out delegate cards in Lower West Pennsboro and I'm exhausted, so I will make this quick.

Lower West Pennsboro Precinct (19th district) :

Ron Paul: 45
McCain: 174
Huckabee: 30

And all 8 Ron Paul delegates won! Hurray!!!

It was reported that only 25% of the registered republicans voted.

I also checked on the results (where I voted) in West Pennsboro Upper (9th district):

Ron Paul: 62
McCain 186
Huckabee: 30

In the afternoon the pollwatching was more cordial. The local machine avoided me and I avoided them. The democrats were still glad to talk to me.
In my precinct we came out with most of the alternate delegates winning and the delegates getting respectable numbers. Ron Paul took about 15% of the vote.

Afterward at the party I learned that more people had better success despite the local GOP trying to force an injunction on our campaign materials. By the way, the machine's top lawyer were defeated in court today by our law student! Our law student went to court and defeated the the injunction. The Local Machine does not know what to do and is running scared.

To finish the night I got my copy of "The Revolution: A Manifesto" as well as the current issue of the Republic Magazine. We've only just begun.

Well, we took 14.2% in our county and 1 out of 3 delegates in our district. Not sure about the alternates. Not to shabby. The delegate is from my meetup so that's cool. We worked hard and will continue because we have no choice. "Let it not be said that we did nothing." ~Ron Paul~

This makes no sense! He dropped out!
But what if there is election fraud?
So McInsane should be a 110%.
What if RP actually was 25% of the Republican vote?
Then you have to dilute it!

All this voting was on electronic machines.
I vote the whole thing is a con.

RP is popular. RP WILL WIN!
Go delegates, you will win for us.
Hardcore, grass roots. You/we rock!

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http://www.youtube.com/wa...
http://www.youtube.com/wa...
Watch and feel the power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To all the people that put up signs in Pittsburgh, Awesome Job! These were big 5'x3' signs by the look of them and they were all in very prominent locations. Other than that my rural polling station was only manned by the few people actually working the polls when I got there. No supporters to be seen. I did see another car with a Ron Paul bumper sticker when i was leaving though. That sure brightened my day. Anyway keep up the good work everyone. I keep on spreading the message of freedom and limited governement wherever i can find an ear.

Election results for Delegates in the Pittsburgh Area. We are doing very well so far. Delegates and Republican Committee Members are in good shape.

http://county.allegheny.p...

And was lucky to catch the after work crowd.

Turn out was high for the democrats, low for the republicans (around 25 -30% % ) Losts of older women, so I look for Hillary to come on late when the rural sections of PA report if my precinct was any indication. I did get a bunch of thumbs up from people, and one guy saying - "oh, these are the guys that Ron needs"

A lot of people were voting quickly, so they were probably not voting for the delegates.

One thing was clear though, for a completely grass roots organization, we are doing great - I talked a while to an Obama delegate. this guy didn't have the districts right, and did not know how the delegates were chosen. The Obama people had lots of people dorr to door but not so many at the polls, and the college students didn't seem to show up. Some of the other local republicans had paid workers.

Which makes me think, that while the national party wants nothing to do with us, the local party may have no choice. We could, through the force of our organization, sway local elections. I'm thinking maybe the idea of taking back the republican party from the ground up can be done.

Who knows the link for delegate returns???? Help!

http://www.electionreturn...

in our precinct there were more (R) than (D) voters -about 95 to 60. I got a few to vote for our delegates while I was there.

Hoping for Good news

CNN must not know that Ron Paul is still in the race. Or is it some other reason why they do not have his name up but still have Huckabee's name up??Hmmmm.

In God We Trust!

You guys and gals are showing us that this hope for America is alive and well and we applaud each and every one of you!
Now, I am going to get back to reading "The Revolution A Manifesto" by Ron Paul.
A great book! ( of course )

at 7:00 and left my wife to cover that place. I proceeded to another area polling place and noticed that our State Senator was working there. I spoke with her and proceeded to hand out our materials for delegates. There were other candidates people working at this polling place and it soon became apparent that they were all under the impression that I was sent by the County machine and our candidates were the Party endorsed individuals. I just didn't have the heart to dissapoint them. I ran short on material 3 times and had to run home to copy more. During this time the other workers were cordial enough to hand out our materials. Shame on me! We had quite a large turnout due to a couple of hotly contested local races. I'm sitting with baited breath waiting for the poll results.