December's Notes From The Underground

December 11th 2004 Notes From The Underground, ARP/JLB Mtg.

Structure…
· Officers – we decided that we would put off electing officers until the January meeting when we expect to see a minimum of 15 people participating.

· Projects – status of projects listed below

· Committees will be project based and we also decided to wait until the January meeting to organize them.

· Discussion – there was a lively discussion of what’s going on and where we are headed. If the excitement level at this meeting is any indication, I have no doubt that we will attract the projected number of fifteen people to the next meeting.

Projects…
· Recruiting - our goal is 8000 people by end of year one. One of the fairly immediate tasks will be to decide how and when to break off into smaller groups in order to maintain active levels of participation/ownership from every partner.

· CD Recording of Capital Homesteading Summary as a recruiting tool. JLB promised to have an original edition done before the next meeting, but speculated that we will be able to find someone else who would prove to be a more effective reader of this material.

· Power Point Presentation for COC’s, ESOP companies, even church groups – this will be a project in which everyone will participate and benefit from wrestling with the Capital Homesteading concept directly in order to develop sufficient confidence to make public presentations on the subject. JLB suggested that Jen Zuri would be the right point person for this project.

· Monica suggested that there are all kinds of local groups who would be candidates to hear a power point presentation. Brooke suggested that everyone come up with a list of these kinds of groups in their own communities.

· Brooke suggested that we should put meeting dates and times on business cards, and everyone liked that idea.

· Interviews with real people on real problems – both Monica and Brook said they would be happy to be interviewed by JLB and Al Robinson of WAVG talk radio and we’ll try to have both of these done before next meeting/

· Web Site/Blog Involvement – everyone agreed to actively participate in a democratic dialog through Joe’s web site message board and on Joe’s Blog starting in the near future….like hopefully this coming week.


· Carol asked about an American Revolutionary Party blog and JLB said Norm Kurland was investigating that possibility, and it’d probably be up by next mtg.

· Joe’s Book – JLB reported that was in the works and would likely be ready by next meeting as well. How do you like the title “The One Big Idea: The Missing Link In America’s Political System and What YOU Can Do About It!” Other suggestions for the title are most welcome.

· Register with FEC - we have the forms to do that when the time comes.

· Establish bank account - JLB suggest that Carol and Pam be co-signatures

· Brochure/Cliff’s Notes – we agreed this project is less important than the CD recordings and the power point presentation, so it was tabled for the time being.

· Data Base – Pam got caught with her hand in the air when this came up, so that project now belongs to her.

· ARP Platform – everyone at the table had read it and seemed to like it. There were no negative comments, only positive ones, but folks will read it more thoroughly before the next meeting.

· Mid Term Elections – everyone agreed that we should be considering a 24 month plan of attack in order to get things moving on a more local level, and to have some suggestions next meeting.

· Jim suggested that a combination book and CD (both of which we’ll have within weeks) could be packaged in the same way that software is packaged and could be something that would look very professional. Jim and JLB will be looking into that possibility and will report back on what they find next meeting.

· Get Barak Obama to our table within the first year – JLB reported that Obama had officially been invited to this meeting, and would continue to get invitations, along with notes and numbers of participants until he shows up.

· JLB said he had talked to a Chicago based homeless newspaper about doing a regular column in their bi weekly newspaper Streetwise and would update the group when he heard more. Brooke suggested the name of the column could be “Through The Cracks.”

· Pam suggests that someone who knows Roberts Rules should be running the meeting from now on, and that someone who knows how to take more conventional notes should take over the Notes From the Underground. Since this suggestion was not formally discussed, we’ll talk about it in January.

· The Onion Headline that JLB failed to come up with on Saturday is “It’s Really Hard When Someone Close To Someone You Pretended To Like, Dies.”