Sent the "Destination Liberty" minority report

Rob, I just sent the PDF you gave me today, along with the following cover letter language I saw from you tonight, to the list of delegates to whom the Chair recently sent the Committee's current recommendations (adopted in February).  495 of the 870 delegates had email addresses, and I have received bounces so far for 35 of them.  I sent it as eight separate emails from 11:58PM to 12:23AM, and only once managed to bump into Comcast's per-message recipient limit.  However, it didn't seem to trigger any restraints on my ability to send, and I included the six over-limit addresses in the next batch. I received four out-of-the-office autoreplies at various times, so it appears that the messages actually went out.

 

If any other group of four or more on the Committee has any minority report(s) that you want emailed out, feel free to send the Secretary your cover letter directly, instead of letting him notice it on Third Party Watch.  :-)

 

Brian

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Brian Holtz [mailto:brian@holtz.org]
Sent: Friday, May 16, 2008 11:58 PM
Subject: Destination Liberty: Platform minority reports

Dear Denver delegate(s),

 

Yesterday the Platform Committee and I were informed for the first time that a four-person subcommittee working on an alternative platform approach has a text that they declare is distributable as a set of minority reports to the Committee's current recommendations.  At mid-day today I received the attached formalization of the subcommittee's work, and tonight I received a cover letter from the subcommittee Chair introducing their draft.  The portions of that letter describing their minority planks is below.

 

Brian Holtz

Secretary, LPUS Platform Committee

 

---

An Open Letter to All Libertarian Convention Delegates:

You recently received a mailing from the Chair of the 2008 Libertarian Platform Committee, Alicia Mattson, describing a draft platform supported by a majority of the Platform Committee.

There is also an official minority report of the Committee, signed by four of the Platform Committee members (Daniel Grow, Henry Haller, Vicki Kirkland, and Rob Power), as required by the Party’s Bylaws to make it official.

Our version of the platform, which keeps the 2004/2006 format of the planks, but significantly reduces the length and number of planks without removing any of the ideas and wisdom of three decades of Libertarian conventions, is available at:

http://www.PlatformUpdate.com

Our minority report is also known as the “Destination Liberty” platform, and we created it as a best effort to accomplish what the www.Restore04.com petition asked us to do. Despite not having the support of the majority of the Platform Committee, we believe our version of the platform has broad-based support in the Party, and we think it’s very important that you, the Delegates, get to see it, read it, and analyze it before arriving in Denver for the Convention. As an official minority report, it will be given to you as one of your choices during the platform sessions of the convention, so it is vital that you have time to read it in advance.

Please consider our Destination Liberty version of the platform as a more reasonable middle ground between the various factions in the Libertarian Party. We appreciate your support.

Sincerely,

2008 Libertarian Platform Committee Members:
Daniel Grow
Henry Haller
Vicki Kirkland
Rob Power