College Republicans

In other news... the College Republicans (yes I still get email from them) have decided they need to plug the new democrat bashing film An American Carol, which you might have seen advertised on CNN if you were watching the debates last night. A right wing lovefest of Bill O'Reilly talking points and Rush Limbaugh medicated wanks, the film is filled with all the juicy bashes conservatives seek.

I say power to them. Its about time they get their own movies outside of Mel Gibson's films and al Qaeda videos. Fiction can be fun, and given the buttwhopin they are about to receive, I think its the least Hollywood Liberals can do to provide them with a fantasy world in which they can revel in their own conservative glory. Just clean off the seats after its over...

I, however, will be joining the rest of young America by seeing Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist... omg!

Without further ado, I give you the latest CR email from Mr. Jack St. Martin

"WHY, AS A CONSERVATIVE,
YOUR MOVIE TICKET MATTERS

The courageous conservative comedy from David Zucker opens in theaters nationwide this weekend. Everyone is watching to see what happens.

Hollywood. The media. The Left. Yes, even Micheal Moore.

Will the pro-American, pro-military, and pro-faith movie AN AMERICAN CAROL beat Bill Maher's anti-Christian RELIGULOUS or Oliver Stone's anti-conservative W. in theaters?

Only you and I have the ability to answer that. Why? Because our decision whether or not to buy a ticket to AN AMERICAN CAROL will determine the outcome.

If we show up to the theater this weekend for AN AMERICAN CAROL, then more conservative movies with conservative actors will be made.

If we stay home, well, then more movies by Oliver Stone and Bill Maher will be at our local theater.

It's that simple. If you love America, support her men and women in uniform, and want to join like-minded people at the theater for some fun …

Then buy a ticket for AN AMERICAN CAROL at www.americancarolers.com

And laugh like your country depends on it.

Thank you for your support.

I just received this email from the College Republican National Committe (via the STORM network - yeah, I'm still on the list).

Hey M. Joseph -

The deadline to register to vote is almost here for most states. If you've changed addresses since the last time you were registered, you need to re-register fast!

You can register now using this link, or by visiting your Secretary of State's web site.

Thanks,
Charlie Smith
National Chairman
College Republicans

P.S. If you've already registered, forward this on to 5 Republican friends.

Unsubscribe Message

The hilarious part is that, in the original email, the bolded text is a link that takes the reader to Rock the Vote's voter registration widget. On the tactical level, that's smart. Rock the Vote is sure to do at least some GOTV work this year, and that's free GOTV for the College Republicans.

From a communications standpoint, it's pure hilarity and sends all sorts of mixed messages. It wasn't more than three weeks ago that the College Republican National Committee was issuing ultimatums to Rock the Vote, and the non-partisan organization is typically a target for Republicans looking to suppress the youth vote.

I guess CRNC was against Rock the Vote before they were for it?

I thought I'd weigh-in on a public battle between B. Lee Drake of the College Democrats and the College Republican National Committee. Last week, Drake posted an op-ed accusing the CRNC of being nothing more than an ineffectual slush fund for the Republican Party:

I don't know about you, but there is a poverty hidden by the seven-figure sums of the CNR budget. Look around you on campus today, and you see students registering each other to vote in record numbers. Of all the groups doing this, the College Republicans of UNM have yet to participate. So long as the organization is treated as a slush fund, they rob themselves of the ability to gather younger recruits and participate in the growth of youth activism. Beyond what speakers or events that student groups host, our most important activity is undoubtedly registering students to vote in the rush to the Oct. 7 deadline. We've even established early voting in the SUB that will last from Oct. 18 to Nov. 1. But the College Republicans have long ago stepped out of that volunteerism and instead sold themselves out to campaign contribution leftovers.

The College Republicans rebutted with an op-ed by Ashley Barbera, in which she pointed out the paucity of funds available to College Democrats due to their status as an appendage of the DNC, and contrasted that to what the CRNC is able to accomplish with their larger budget.

I won't argue with the first part of Barbera's piece. I've written at length about how the College Democrats are financially disadvantaged by remaining within the DNC. And I don't think Drake is right in saying that the CRNC is a slush fund for the Republican Party. However, the College Republican's budget requires much closer scrutiny, as do Barbera's claims.

Barbera touts the CRNC's fundraising prowess, and notes that

Our money comes from a national network of 110,000 supporters, mostly small-dollar donors, who recognize the importance of reaching out to young voters.

According to Open Secrets, the College Republican National Committee has raised $4.7 million this cycle. Of that money, a full 73% - $3.2 million - went back into fundraising. What's going on here? Well looking into the expenditures it becomes clear:

2008 CRNC Budget by Expenditures

$3.2 million to Infocision Management, a Republican direct mail and telemarketing firm. The College Republicans aren't a slush fund, but they aren't a mega-funded super org either. They're an incredibly inefficient direct mail and telemarketing operation that spends 75 cents for every dollar it raises. And this money does not come, as Barbera suggests, from 110,000 small donors who "understand the need to reach out to young voters." As this article in the Seattle Times makes clear, the vast majority of donors who give to the CRNC have no idea they are giving money to the college Republicans. They are elderly men and women, tricked into giving by dishonest telemarketing and direct mail scams. In the last three electoral cycles, the number one employment category of individual donors to the CRNC is "retired."

Looking further into the CRNC's 2008 expenditures, almost 1/4 of a million dollars goes to consultants - almost as much as the $373k the organization paid to its employees. The College Republicans aren't a $4.8 million juggernaut of youth organizing. Once you take out the money spent on fundraising, they are a $1.2 million org that spends 1/5 of its budget padding the pockets of consultants.

I'm sure the rebuttal from the CRNC will be that this is still far better than the College Democrats, but comparing the College Democrats and College Republicans is like comparing apples and oranges. As Barberra herself states, CDA is an appendage of the DNC, while the CRNC is an independent 527, able to raise much greater sums of money on its own and operate independently of the Republican Party. As such, CRNC's closest analogue on the Democratic side of the aisle is the Young Democrats of America, also a 527 organization.

According to Open Secrets' analysis of YDA's expenditures for 2008, the group has raised far less money than CRNC, but the vast majority of YDA's expenditures go towards salaries and programs for young voter outreach. They spend only a fraction of their total budget on fundraising. In fact, even with a budget that is only a fraction of the CRNC's overall budget, YDA still manages to spend more money on their staff and programs than does the CRNC:

YDA 2008 Budget Expenditures:

Now, I'm not looking to do a full comparison between YDA and the CRNC in terms of program, though I suspect such a comparison will be equally favorable to YDA. Even College Republicans on the CRNC's own blog question their reports about the tens of thousands of new recruits and hundred thousand phone calls cited by Barbera.

Such criticisms from within the organization are also directed at STORM, the social action network/CRM (constituent relationship manager) developed by CRNC. STORM was another accomplishment touted by Barberra, though it is hard to see why. The network is a barren wasteland, used by almost no one; so much so that I was able to infiltrate the network and become one of the "STORM Top 40" - a group of top recruiters given free housing and credentials at the Republican National Convention. This took almost no effort on my part, and to this day, my STORM profile confirms that I only recruited 17 people into the network. Reports on the CRNC blog say that STORM cost between $250 and $300k. Friends in the CMS/CRM business assure me that this price is outrageous for what is essentially a glorified database and email program.

Taking a longer view of the CRNC vs YDA budget also produces some rather unfavorable trends for CRNC. Whereas the YDA budget is growing each year, and YDA always operates within their budget, the CRNC's budget has shrunk dramatically in the last four years. And - ironically for the party of "fiscal responsibility" - CRNC can't seem to operate within their means, racking up massive debt in 2004 and 2006.

CRNC Budgets by Cycle

So while Drake may have missed the mark with his op-ed against the College Republicans, Barbera's response wasn't much better. A closer look at CRNC unmasks the organization as a paper tiger with more bark than bite.

• Early voting begins today in Virginia, Kentucky and Georgia. If that's where you live, stop reading this and go vote!
• Next week is Ohio's "Golden Week," when you can register to vote and cast your ballot on the same day. If you want to go help out in the state next week, volunteer here.
• The National Conference on Citizenship released its Third Civic Health Index today. They also held their annual conference today (which I was supposed to attend - apologies to all for not making it down). I'll have more later, but for now, you can read another blogger's take here.
• 29-year-old Nate Willems, also a blogger, is running for State Senate in Iowa. Best of luck, Nate, and we'd love to have you here anytime to blog about the experience.
• Turns out that email is not a dying medium among today's youth afterall. (Warning, this link will take you to the most obnoxious sign-up process in history. Go at your own risk).
• Trying to wrap your head around this economic mess we now find ourselves in? Go read this article in The Nation.
• FiveThirtyEight.com notes that some folks are getting their feathers ruffled as the Obama campaign directs funds away from swag like lawn signs towards other things like field work. Oh, the horror! Hey, sounds right to me.
• Michael Moore is encouraging everyone to download his new movie, "Slacker Uprising," about his tour of colleges and universities in 2004. Moore will by live blogging on Daily Kos tonight at 11pm Eastern.
• The Swing Semester Syllabus is now online.
• The Daily Pennsylvanian has an excellent interview with Howard Dean about the role of young people in this election and remaking the Democratic Party.
• P. Diddy may be off on the sidelines, uploading crazy-ass YouTube videos every week, but celebrity-driven politics is bigger than ever. Ad Week has the skinny.
• New York State College Dems are gearing up for the election. So are a lot of College Dem chapters, but NYS keeps popping up in my Google Alerts and on blogs. They've got a much larger online footprint than other College Dem chapters, which is a good thing. That's how you get noticed. More chapters should be as active within the blogosphere.
• This is funny. A Republican candidate is crying foul over her loss in a recent primary. The crime? Her opponent registered and GOTV'd too many College Republicans. I'm sure there's a joke about eating your young in there . . .

[CROSS-POSTED FROM MICHIGAN YOUTH POLITICAL ALLIANCE]

Obama's message of hope and change has reached out to millions of young voters, and I do not understand how some people can not understand why. Republicans think it might have to do with the age of the candidate, so they bring in Palin. Now, she may be "young," but she certainly does not bring nearly the same understanding to issues that concern youth voters the most as Obama does.

With a young population experiencing piled-up college debt and the pressure of finding new jobs, they refuse to believe that a continuation of the current administration could be the solution, especially since John McCain barely shares the compassion Obama does for education and job growth. Our youth have also become disillusioned by the failed policies of the Iraq War and have felt the stress of escalating costs of health care within their families. Who deals with these issues with an eye out for how we feel? I don't see McCain caring much about what we think. The latest Gallup polls from September 7 reveal our thoughts exactly--60% favor Obama while only 32% favor McCain.

But putting all political affiliation aside, will youth participation shock us this election season?

Update: I just want to add that this is pretty standard for the Republicans. As Thomas Frank ably describes in his new book, Wrecking Crew, ever since the days of Abramoff and Norquist, the college Republicans have fought to defund or delegitimize organizations that they perceived as being too far to the left. And in 2004, Ed Gillespie, chairman of the RNC, engaged in a high-profile dispute with Rock the Vote. This is just another extension of those tactics and that fight.
-------------------------------------

I've alluded a few times to a big, upcoming story on what I did at the RNC. I'd hoped to have another week or so of anonymity, but my cover is blown, and the College Republicans are attacking one of our own, so it's time to come clean.

Last week, I attended the RNC. I wasn't a credentialed blogger, as I was at the DNC, and I wasn't a protester shaking my fist at the Xcel Center. I attended the Republican National Convention on the dime of the College Republicans, who gave me free housing, free credentials for each night, and access to all their events. They didn't do this out of the kindness of their hearts, they did it because I tricked them.

In an effort to increase the number of active users on STORM, the College Republican social network, the CRNC held a contest this summer in which the top 40 recruiters on the network (the "STORM 40") would receive free housing at the Republican National Convention. Myself, with the help of a number of friends, created an account and won a spot in that top 40. It wasn't even all that hard.

Today, the beans were spilled, and the College Republicans finally figured out what went on. Now they're attacking our own Sarah Burris because an article in City Pages improperly identified her as a Rock the Vote employee who participated in this project:

“This sort of behavior from an employee of a non-partisan organization is completely unacceptable,” said Ethan Eilon, Executive Director of the College Republican National Committee. “Sarah Burris’ participation in Connery’s plot is unethical at best, and is possibly illegal. The College Republicans demand that Burris be dismissed from her position, and that Rock the Vote issue a public apology for their connection to this matter.”

College Republican National Chairman Charlie Smith added: “Connery and Burris’ twisted plot of lies and subterfuge is ridiculous behavior in a free and open democracy. Their sad attempt to embarrass the College Republicans demonstrates the liberal desperation to discredit the conservative youth movement. Barack Obama’s advantage with young voters is rapidly dwindling. Several recent polls have shown Obama’s lead among young voters has dropped from 30 points to nearly single digits in only a month. Connery and Burris’ behavior shows that Democrats will clearly do anything to disguise the rapid shift of young voters towards the candidacies of Senator John McCain and Governor Sarah Palin.”

To be clear, Sarah is not an employee of Rock the Vote, she is an independent contractor. And at no time did she use Rock the Vote's time, money, or access to promote my infiltration of the RNC. Rock the Vote has zero connection to this project.

If the College Republican social network was at all robust, or if they had done even the smallest amount of vetting, this would not have been possible. It's understandable that they are upset and feel the need to push back, but their attacks against Sarah and Rock the Vote, however, are completely off base and unsubstantiated.

Since this is all finally starting to come out, I also want to be clear as to my own behavior and motives. I did not do this to "embarrass" the College Republicans. I did this in an attempt to discover what the College Republicans really think about their status in the minority position within their generation; to uncover, without PR or spin, what that means for their organizing efforts on campus; to directly compare the youth organizing at the DNC to its Republican counterpart; and to see if the College Republicans, with its $5 million budget, really is an organizing powerhouse or just a paper tiger padding the accounts of Republican consultants. In some of this, I was successful, in other areas I wasn't. I'll write more about that later.

If I wanted to embarrass the College Republicans, I had ample opportunity. There were tons of media at the convention, and my little STORM group (only 15 of who actually came to the RNC), was in the press quite a bit - from MTV to UPI. If I wanted to mess with the College Republicans or the Republican youth message, I could have easily done so.

Instead, I mostly stayed out of the media - I wasn't looking to punk anyone in that way. I didn't goad anyone while I was in St. Paul into saying things they would regret, and I tried hard to lie as little as possible. I even supplied my real name and email address when signing up for this contest. If anyone asked me whether or not I was writing an article, I would have broken cover and told the truth. At no time were such questions raised. If people assume you believe the same things they do, it's amazing how far you can get in conversations by just offering straight political analysis.

More to come.

Two things in need of debunking today. First, Sarah informs me that Newsweek reporter Christopher Dickey was on Talk of the Nation today making scurrilous claims about 2004 youth turnout. When a caller asked him about the youth vote and their potential impact in November, here's what he had to say (paraphrase):

Dickey:"No, because young people don't vote"
Talk of the Nation: "Well they sure came out in primaries and caucuses this year"
Dickey: "Well they did but they were so bothered by Bush in 2004 but they failed to elect John Kerry... "

As all of you know, young people increased their vote by 4.3 million and their turnout rose from 40 to 49% over 2000 levels. They were also the only age demographic to vote for John Kerry, favoring the Democrat 54 - 45% over President Bush.

Resting the entire election on the shoulders of a single demographic is a dishonest and unfair analysis. As a friend and colleague of mine likes to say "the youth vote never turns out until they do. And even then it wasn't enough." Damned if you do, damned if you don't, aye Mr. Dickey?

If you have time, write Mr. Dickey a friendly email stating just that. His email address is shadowland [at] newsweek [dot] com.

Second, the delusional College Republicans hang their hat on a single poll by Zogby (of all people) to claim that McCain is starting to take the youth vote away from Obama:

However, a new ATV/ Zogby poll shows that is not the case, and that McCain’s support among young voters is increasing rapidly. The poll says that “McCain gained 20% and Obama lost 16% among voters ages 18-29.” Obama still leads among young voters 49%-38%, but with the way his support has been increasing, we might see McCain becoming very competitive for the youth vote soon.

This poll just goes to show that you shouldn’t believe all the hype. Young people all across America are getting excited for John McCain and the GOP, and will turn out in large numbers for our candidates in the fall.

I wouldn't put nearly so much faith in Zogby. He's notoriously inaccurate and with only ~1,000 respondents in the whole poll, his data on young voters probably has a ridiculously high margin of error. Add in the fact that he used landlines, and so probably missed a lot of low-income and Latino "cell only" users (who are also young) makes me think even less of his results.

And besides. 49% - 38%? If you assume a margin of error of even 5% points, that could put the race for young voters at 54 - 33%, not too far off from the Dem vs. Repub congressional results in the 2006 wave election. I'll take that margin anyday.

It's a bit of a slow news day (unless Obama decides he's going to announce Bayh as his VP in the next couple hours). Most of my reading today has been tech heavy. Here's what I'm looking at:

• At WireTap, Sarah has an excellent piece up about rural broadband.
• For any organizations out there thinking about revamping their website, The Bivings Report will help you figure out if you need a content management system.
• Colin Delaney looks at how CRM software can help legislators better manage constituent relations work.
• Kevin Bondelli notes that the College Republicans are trying to counter program in Denver during the DNC. I've already signed up to receive their text messages and emails. Can progressive youth groups in Denver counter-program their counter-programming?
• PEW finds that McCain's Britney/Paris ads did have some effect after all: they dragged his campaign out of the shadows, giving him parity with Obama in the media coverage for the first time in weeks. I guess in that sense they were effective.

I’ve landed in Nashville. I’m sure I’ll be seeing some of you at the YDA conference tomorrow. For the rest of you, I’ll be live-blogging as I can depending on the WiFi access, which wasn’t all that great at the last YDA conference.

Over at The Next Right (sort of an “Open Left” for conservatives), Ethan Eilon, the Executive Director of the College Republicans is saying some smart things about young people and their relation ship to the GOP. Specifically, he’s calling on the Republican Party to wake up and start reaching out to young voters. The whole thing reads very much like stuff you heard out of Democratic youth circles 4 years ago (and still do today though people seem to be getting the message).

His advice to the party is good and will be familiar to many here: go where young people congregate (online), make an effort to promote effective youth leaders in the party. Address youth issues on the stump, etc. The piece is valuable reading for anyone in either party looking to court young voters. But he’s got two huge problems.

First is the straight up math of what we’re seeing now:

Now, I'm not naive enough to suggest that we make these changes and all of a sudden we are going to win the 18-19 vote 80/20, but we don't need to. We just need to not lose it by that margin, which is exactly what current trends, if left unchecked, will yield.

That’s really the crux of it. There’s very little chance that the Republicans will eat into Democratic gains among Millennials unless the Democrats drop youth outreach altogether and/or severely mess something up policy wise. McCain was probably the best candidate choice for Republicans to make an attempt at courting youth, but eve he won’t be enough and he’ll likely have little influence down-ticket in an environment so toxic to traditional Republicans. The GOP is now in the unenviable position of doing electoral triage for a generation. It’s not about winning anymore; it’s about losing as little (young) blood as possible.

The problem is that the Republican brand is not just tarnished – that in itself is a tough hurdle to overcome (see Democrats: National Security) – but the governing philosophies of conservatism itself are rejected by Millennials. That’s why this is more than a little wishful thinking:

We need to get very serious about making our brand more appealing to young voters, and to get young people bought into the overall concept of what this party is about: limited government and individual liberty. This is not a hard sell, but when the Democrats and their affiliates are outspending us in the demographic by 25 to 1 we are going to have an uphill battle.

Culture war issues promoted by the Republican Party restrict individual liberty (gay rights, right to choose, etc.) in ways that the multicultural, tolerant Millennials find repellent, and limited government is a failed proposition. For a generation that lived through Katrina (and exhortations from Grover Norquist to “drown the government in a bathtub), limited government fails to recognize the responsibility that a government has to its citizens to provide opportunity and security. These will not be winning talking points for reaching out to today’s youngest voters.

Finally, I would just like to point out that the 25 – 1 number cited by Eilon is highly disputable. The College Republicans had well over $20 million in expenditures over the last 4 years: dwarfing spending by the College and Young Democrats (from Open Secrets):

And while it is true that Democrats have focused far more than Republicans on GOTV in recent years, the amount of money going through the conservative leadership pipeline is about 5 – 10 times more than what equivalent progressive organizations have to work with. Campus Progress thoroughly debunked similar claims made by Young America Foundation Alum Jason Mattera earlier this year (below). There are rumors that the CRNC is nothing more than a money funnel conservatives use to direct money to other “grown up” projects, and that the College Republicans actually see little to no of their tens of millions raised/spent. So perhaps there is a grain of truth here, but if so doesn’t that just speak to the moral bankruptcy of the Republican Party?

In the words of Stephen Colbert, I give a wag of the finger to Smith College Republicans, who sponsored a virulently anti-gay speaker to come to their school and lecture on the "born gay hoax." Conversely, tip of the hat to Smith students for mounting a spirited protest.

The Smith College Republicans sponsored a speaking event featuring Ryan Sorba, author of the upcoming book The Born Gay Hoax. After about twenty minutes he was forced to abandon his speech after protesters forced their way into the room and drowned him out. I'll send videos and articles when they are available, but I thought I'd give you a heads up and ask you to please cover this action. I couldn't be more proud to be a Smithie right now, after I saw so many amazing young feminists come together to stand up against this asshat and his hate.

Looks like the always obnoxious, controversy-seeking Young America's Foundation was also involved.

Here's some video of the speaker and the ensuing protest.

Hat tip to Pam Spaulding, too, for picking this up.