On Friday, August 13, I ran a post Coffee Party Grows Cold, highlighting a post on the Coffee Party’s website titled Reversing the Coffee Party’s decline about how the Coffee Party was in decline.
On Saturday night, August 14, Instapundit kindly linked to my post, which lit up the old SiteMeter with plenty of out clicks to the Coffee Party website; many other blogs linked to or ran with the story.
At some point on Sunday, August 15, the original post was removed from the Coffee Party website, and readers now see this:
But not to worry, I figured this would happen, so before running my post I captured the original post:
Here is the full text of the post (highlights are mine):
Having visited Coffee Party chapters in two states, and having heard from other city and state organizers, I definitely know we’re in decline. Chapters have folded, events are less well-attended, and morale is at a low. I want to use this forum to explore why that is. To me, it has to do with several individual and organizational problems: 1) We lack a consistent focus on one or two policy issues. We move from event to event without sticking with a certain cause and motivating our members persistently engaged. Events are fine if all we want to do is talk, but it’s clear that many of our members (myself included) see this movement as a vehicle for real policy change.
2) At the root of 1) is that the organization lacks democratic accountability. Event decisions are set at the top and conveyed downward. This is totally turning the idea of a grassroots movement on its head. All decisions should be made at the chapter (or Coffee shop) level, and conveyed upward. The job of those at the top is to make sure that the people at the bottom have made a decision, and to encourage the movement as a whole to move as one solid mass (at least on certain policies or initiatives). After all, politics is about strength in numbers.
3) Effective democracy requires transparency. The decision to have a convention was made at the top without any input from the grassroots, even though it used ordinary members’ donations. The organization’s financial records should be posted online and updated regularly (monthly or quarterly). All decisions about spending in excess of $10,000 (or, once we grow, over 10% of revenues) should be made by the grassroots.
4) Politicians know who they can ignore. Right now, we’re ignorable, because no matter how passionate we are about certain issues (e.g., money in politics), most of us don’t vote with those issues at the front of our minds. As a result, candidates dispense platitudes about how they support our efforts, knowing they’ll never have to risk their political careers to vote on these issues. The free pass we give our elected leaders must end now. If we believe money in politics is the root of our social ills, then we should have the fortitude to vote people in and out on that issue alone. If that thins out the political herd too much, then we should be willing to nominate members from our own ranks, or from our communities, to seek elected office.
That’s all I have so far. Let me know what you think. I’d really like to spread this conversation around so that we can get some positive change implemented.
In addition to the point made in my original post about the Coffee Party declining, notice how the author is complaining about top-down decision making and use of donations without accountability.
These Coffee Party supporters really are naive, and are just beginning to understand that their good intentions are being used by professional organizers to create the appearance of a grassroots movement in support of Obama’s agenda.
The author also complained about lack of transparency at the Coffee Party. And now the post and all the comments to the post have been removed from the Coffee Party’s website.
Have you people ever read Animal Farm? Or don’t they stock that at the Coffee Party bookstore?
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Comments
Nice work, William.
Of course they stock "Animal Farm." They also stock "1984." Why wouldn't they? Don't Christian churches stock the Bible? 🙂
I would think the only reason the Coffee Party didn't work was because it had no soul of its own. It was a parasite site dependent solely on the perceived evils of another well-known party and all the wishing of liberals could not make it function. This should be a lesson in reality over dreams, but alas, I doubt they are capable of reason.
McClatchy is all over the story. NOT.
http://www.kentucky.com/2010/08/15/1393049/tom-eblen-coffee-party-prepares.html
Hit wrong button, accidentally deleted this comment:
Dessert Survivor:
"Event decisions are set at the top and conveyed downward." Translation: "We are an astroturfed organization."
Excellent screen-grabbery.
The poster sounds so sincere, so earnest. She really believes that the people should have a voice. There's an expectation here that hasn't been managed properly. Clearly she missed the Astroturf all-on-the-same-page Stalinist orientation sessions, and watching the Tea Party movement with its actual energized grassrootiness has doubtless engendered feelings of (a) envy and (b) inadequacy.
Well, as someone who had first hand experience with Annabel Park's and Eric Byler's selective editing and skewing of facts during their 9500 Liberty "documentary", the demise of the "Coffee Party" doesn't surprise me. They did something similar, trying to gin up support for illegal aliens by hosting events at local businesses that catered to the illegal alien trade. That didn't go anywhere either.
But what about their "INFRASTRUCTURE!" platform? I remember watching a video of an interminable Coffee Party meeting where they endlessly discussed potential action items. I remember that "INFRASTRUCTURE!" was the only policy item they could all agree on. It seemed like a winner to me. You mean it didn't take off? Bummer.
Re: Editor, posted 8/16 @ 4:55AM
They are incapable of Reason _and are devoid of creativity. In their minds mockery and snark qualify as creativity.
Note the Coffee Party as a quasi antithesis to the Tea Party. As you very rightly observed, the Tea Party movement is indeed that, a movement. The Coffee Party, such as it is, is another top-down, centrally stage-managed astroturf eyebath.
Another observation on creativity: Shortly after Jan 2009, I saw a square bumper sticker that simply read "O The President". I thought to myself, "That's all you have, a take off on the former Preseident's bumper sticker?"
Both indicate a complete lack of original thought and only the barest ability to mock what they dislike.
Did you offer to return their lost post?
The bit I like is that the average rating of the removed article was 3.5 out of 5 (see the screenshot). Which I believe is somewhat better than the Chosen One's current approval ratings.
They stock "Animal Farm" and "1984," but they most resemble, "Lord of the Flies."
The local Peace and Justice Center was once questoned about whether there were any Communist organizations who used it. The Director assured the reporter they did not. However, a check of both their web site and that of the CPUSA revealed that not only was the local CPUSA chapter meeting there, but the Director was given as the contact. Over night both web sites were purged, but of course, nothing is ever really lost on the internet.
the coffee party has nearly 300,000 followers on fb. no tea party site on fb had more than 4,000 even though the tea party has it's own media network in faux news and guys like Mr. Jacobson. The Koch brothers, the nra, freedom works, and a plethora of other billionaire boy club members, fund the tea parties.
the "head" of the coffee party is annabel park. a housewife who has had enough for corporate influence in our elections and decided to do something about it. just a girl. no big money behind this housewife. no "news" channels to tout her every event.
No, doubt, Mr. jacobson is a little jealous that one housewife could bring in about 300,000 friends in a few months while his site is empty as are the teabaggers fb pages.
if the coffee party is dwindling, the tea party is already dead.
don't be afraid of dissent mr. jacobson. you give these idiots a false sense of security. let them believe that THEY surround US. that's about as much bs as there can be. let them know "we" are not alone. let them see for themselves how pathetic the tea party is in comparison to the money that's been tossed at it and the promotion it's gotten on faux. you've never heard of the coffee party on tv and it's already bigger than the tea party. pretty pathetic isn't it mr jacobson. i'd be embarrassed and write lies about it being an astroturf organization too.. after all, you are in republican opposite world. where those who really are funded by the big billionaires are grass roots and the one that was started by a housewife and a computer is astroturf. you, sir are a liar and i doubt you will ever let your blind readers see any truth on these pages.
This post should be updated. The thread on CoffeePartyUSA is on the site, but with a new title: Sept. Convention: Reversing Coffee Party's decline. Find it here: http://www.coffeepartyusa.com/content/sept-convention-reversing-coffee-partys-decline
Unfortunately, this new title perverts the original meaning of the post, and probably draws new people away from posting there. (This is on top of the fact that the name-change has caused all the old links to it to break.) In any case, there is still no official word from the Coffee Party moderators as to why this is.