From: werme@alliant.com (Ric Werme)
Subject: Re: unfair treatment of LP (getting better in New Hampshire)
Organization: Alliant Computer Systems Corp.
Distribution: alt
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 14:57:47 GMT

In article <1992Jul16.151803.13864@husc3.harvard.edu> thaxter@husc8.harvard.edu (Jason Thaxter) writes:
>In article <marrou.711230177@eola.cs.ucf.edu> marrou@cs.ucf.edu (Lance R. Marrou) writes:
>>I have noticed, when watching the news, that the reporters and 
>>anchorpersons do not even consider Libertarians in the race.  When
>>discussing the election, they refer to the "three candidates:
>>Bush, Clinton, and Perot", not the four candidates: Bush, Clinton,
>>Perot, and Marrou.

>	Although they are widely percieved as being objective, enquiring minds
>know they are not.  Lastest outrage:  After Perot's anouncement today that he
>is dropping out of the race (amazing that he declared he was dropping out w/o
>anouncing, ever, that he was in it), a CNN talking head concluded that the
>American people now have no choice but to vote for Clinton or Bush.

The day Perot announced he would not run, the major TV station in NH, WMUR
interviewed one of Perot's main volunteers for the 1800 newscast.  True to
form, they cut one response just before he said they were considering
supporting Marrou.  This was really rather annoying, since the only times
they mentioned the LP was after Marrou's win in Dixville Notch in the
primary and our candidates filing rally.  A rather impressive flurry of
telephone activity spreading the word among Libertarians that WMUR supressed
us again caused several calls to WMUR.  At 2300 they ran the same interview
and then mentioned that the station had been inundated by calls from
Libertarians noting that still had a choice with Marrou.  The next day they
interviewed Miriam Luce, one of the LP candidates for governor.  I'm
impressed, especially after some of the things my wife called them....

WMUR apparently is going spend more time covering the LP, which is Major Good
News, as most of the people in the state can get them.

The arch conservative Union Leader newspaper is also getting much softer.
Less than a year ago they ran articles about how an LP government would
have drug dealers on every corner and prostitutes in every neighborhood.
(Of course, the LP would much prefer drugs in every pharmacy and the collapse
of the organized crime distribution system we now have, but that's hard to
explain to the Union Leader!)  After a positive commentary piece after the
Dixville Notch win, they have gradually been giving us more space, running
press releases from local candidates and some from national.

This is also Major Good News, as the Union Leader is the only paper widely
availble throughout the state and is read by all other newspaper editors.

Why has this happened?

Some quickies:

1) Campaigning in Dixville Notch in the presidential primary was a great
   move.  No one expected we would win, and much media wrote it off as a
   fluke or ignored it because they couldn't get a sound bite from someone
   saying he cast the vote as a protest.  However, I think the press,
   especially in NH, started listening and are beginning to start talking.

2) We have a contested primary for governor!  This makes it harder for
   pollsters to ignore us.  (This is a whole other subject and sore point.)
   Miriam Luce won 5% of the vote in the last election and got us major
   party status.  Cal Warburton is a State Rep who switched from R to L.

3) What better state for the LP to get serious than one whose motto is "Live
   free or die" and is printed on all our license plates?

4) Strong party leadership that keeps the whole LP platform in mind.  One
   thing it tried to do for this election is:

5) Run 85 +/- candidates in the upcoming election.  The press (and other
   political parties) will have trouble ignoring that!

One longy:

Biological evolution moves fastest in the fringes of a population.  Mutations
occurring in the middle tend to get swamped by the status quo.  I'm beginning
to think that a similar process is occurring here.  NH has a sizable French
speaking population, we're next to Canada, etc.  Alaska is another state ripe
for a LP movement.  Another big help is that our state House of Representatives
is huge (425?), about one rep per 2500 candidates.  We know that anyone can
become a State Rep, and it's feasible to meet ALL your voters.  My wife made
a "Vote Libertarian" sign in time for a July 4th parade.  Our current governor
was one of the first people to see it.  On July 5th she tested it out on an
interstate highway bridge before taking it to a fireworks show.  One food
vendor at the show had already seen the sign while driving down!

Ultimately, change can happen quickly here.  Now that the media is beginning
to take us seriously, it's going to move quicker.  If we can fill the void
Perot suddenly created, change will move quicker still.
-- 
| A pride of lions               | Eric J Werme                 |
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| An odd lot of programmers      | Mont Vernon NH  03057	|
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