The PPA, lets talk numbers vs results.

[Skallagrim]

Given that repealing, amending, or otherwise exempting poker from the UIGEA has got to be the PPA's top priority, that most of their money is spent on lobbying does not surprise or bother me. Lobbyists accomplish most of what is done in DC.

Grassroots organizing is an interesting concept here, others are experts there though, so I only offer my humble opinion that TE's work prior to his board membership, and TE's continued work now that he is on the board, seem like the most that we can accomplish at the "grassroots" right now. I do also believe, however, that motivating and involving our members even more will happen in the future.

I personally would like the PPA to also involve itself more in litigation (like the ACLU and NRA do also), and have already communicated my specific ideas regarding that to TE. Having a central resource to help defend poker players in Court would be a great asset, both to the members and in terms of positive publicity.

As to taxes, I still dont see the urgency there; the Wexler bill is tax neutral for us, the Frank bill anticipates new taxes, but nothing specific is in there yet ... I dont think it a smart move to turn our back on Barney (especially since he is the "freedom" guy as opposed to the "skill games are different" guy) just because onerous taxes might be later proposed.

The PPA did move, and moved pretty good, with the help of its local Rep Randy, to respond to the MA casino bill hypocracy ... that effort continues, so what else exactly should the PPA do D$D? I like the idea of more "grassroots" movement in general, but what are you specifically suggesting?

Skallagrim

[Tuff_Fish]

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IMO we are exceedingly weak as a poker community. It is the community itself who is at fault as much as it is the PPA's.

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For having millions of online poker players in the US as some claim, we certainly don't make much of a showing politically.

I don't know how to fix it, but that is the problem.

Tuff

[TheEngineer]

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I personally would like the PPA to also involve itself more in litigation (like the ACLU and NRA do also), and have already communicated my specific ideas regarding that to TE. Having a central resource to help defend poker players in Court would be a great asset, both to the members and in terms of positive publicity.

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Agree 100%. This aligns perfectly with the PPA mission statement. John Pappas and I have discussed this a few times. I thank you again for putting your plan together. I'll discuss this again with John next time we speak (currently scheduled for Friday).

[DeadMoneyDad]

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Interesting observations. I passed them along to John Pappas and Bryan.

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I have spoken to both about my concerns some as recently as last night.

But thanks for the effort.


D$D

[TheEngineer]

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Interesting observations. I passed them along to John Pappas and Bryan.

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I have spoken to both about my concerns some as recently as last night.

But thanks for the effort.


D$D

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No problem.

[Grasshopp3r]

The PPA didn't step up for the cool UIGEA poker chips, which pisses me off. That was a huge bang for the buck effort.

[DeadMoneyDad]

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Recently, the PPA had a fly-in to Washingto D.C. for many of their State Reps who were able to attend for a seminar on "How to Lobby Congress" and then sent those people into the field and had them do exactly that. I am told about 100 members attended.

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I attended the fly-in.

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That said, I take nothing from you because if you are a PPA member, (and I hope you are), then it is indeed your right to question the PPA Administration. But I ask you this, have you called and spoke with anyone from the PPA about your concerns? You might be pleasantly surprised what you'll learn.

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Actually I was more often than not unpleasantly suprised the more I learned.

I know there is a ton of work to accomplish what has been accomplished on the Hill.

I imgaine there are a thousand or more issues I may never know anything about.

My main point and from the recent news article John was quoted as saying the organization is moving in the grassroots direction. My question is more of one of speed and commitment to that effort.

Building a grassroots organization that is worth a damn is very hard work. It requires a good deal of commitment first from the parent organization to begin to motivate its membership. But if sucessful there is a tipping point where every ounce of energy and dime of investment comes back in some mutiple of the investment.

IMO we should to day be well at seeing that tipping point in terms of where we need to be as an organization to achieve the goals ahead of us.

I've made whatever name I have in this game from both doing it right from the begining as well as comming in late and cleaning up the mess and squandered opportunities and time of less sucessful efforts. Of the two I prefer starting early, it is not only more fun it is more often sucessful.

IMO right now it is not too late for almost anyone with good experience to make this happen in time. But with every passing week the effort will get harder and ultimately more expensive. This will either be in the final result or the amount of money and effort to get the job done.


D$D

[DeadMoneyDad]

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"I am completely baffled at the continual reliance of this organization to pay for things that many it could get for free for the asking. "

Your general gist is answered by the MassRep who posted in this thread .... there was a significant "grassroots" education involved in the Fly-In.

Your bafflement as to allocation of PPA financial resources seems feigned. You have experience in DC. A lobbying organization PAYS for things because the people running it often have friends who sell it things. There are hundreds of people in DC who make a lot of money by selling things to lobbying groups, you name it and someone will be selling it. It is an industry.

You want to SELL the PPA on its need for allocating resources, get in line with others who are selling other themes. (I am not implying your post is a direct pitch for your expertise/services.)

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Actually my point is fairly close to yours in that because this town is built the way it is, it is often too easy to try and buy what you think you need when for a little more initial investment like buying a house with a down payment your over all costs are much less than renting.

Part of the problem might have arrisen from one of my initial meetings with John. I wasn't very clear in an answer I gave John to a passing question and I may very well been seen as one of the thousands in this town trying to pitch a bill of good.

I am completely uncomfortable with the course of my relationship with John. I called him initially to simply volunteer, over a month later before we got a chance to meet he told me he was looking to hire a grassroots person. I did "apply" for that position while the initial meeting had been more properly an open offer of suport and any help needed.

This mixed up nature of my desire to do whatever was needed to help the cause was further muddled before the fly-in as I had lined up various offers of help for the fly-in and John had originally said the decision on the grassroots position would be made before the fly-in. So we ended up again trying to accomplish mutiple goals in a single meeting.

So to some degree I understand if John doesn't have a warm and fuzzy feeling about my commitment to the cause. Our personal time tables and goals has been very mixed up to say the least.

However other than my off hand answer to John's question about my opinion oif the cost of a real grassroots effort in KY, I have never pitched John a single idea, product, or service for personal gain.

What pains me is the number of free or at worst number of things I have suggested at or near wholesale costs that I have tracked down and offered with no mark up on my part that haven't been seriously considered or later purchased at full retail.

But if you add in my tourtured relationship with TE and being identified as a critic of the PPA, when I thought my motives were fairly clear to John, I guess it is understandable that perhaps I was percieved as just another campaign hand and former Federal Appointee trying to make a living in DC. Near as I can tell John has been hit up almost all of them at one time or another, and with every piece of press his phone must ring even more. This last one concerning spending might have really brought out some of the bottom feeders in droves.

But grassroots in many campaigns is often the "red headed step child" semi-tolerated, called a family member when the need arrises but never really trusted.

Sadly grassroots does more with less dollars than any other portion of any campaign. I've been involved in efforts where I had to raise every dollar I needed, even though fund raising was never ever any part of my duties.

So this really is more of a conceptional argument. Unless the "powers that be" have experienced the return of a good grassroots effort they are hard to convince. As you stated there are too many people with fancy spread sheets and power point presentations who make good livings selling crap in this town. The net effect is too many people who have been around for any length of time have been burned and get a little jaded to what often sounds like empty promises.


D$D

[DeadMoneyDad]

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The PPA didn't step up for the cool UIGEA poker chips, which pisses me off. That was a huge bang for the buck effort.

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That was one hell of a deal the wholeseller was willing to do! With a little lead time the PPA could have sold off autographed chipsets from the pros and their net cost would have been a profit!

I've still got the guy's contact info and spoke to him last month.

Damn they were pretty.... casino quality custom printed damn near for free.

You did well on that one.


D$D

[DeadMoneyDad]

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Given that repealing, amending, or otherwise exempting poker from the UIGEA has got to be the PPA's top priority, that most of their money is spent on lobbying does not surprise or bother me. Lobbyists accomplish most of what is done in DC.

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However, it is the grassroots efforts in those Rep's States that makes the Lobbyists job much easier. IMO we have convinced close to the maximum members we can on the logic and merits of our case. Perhaps there are more that can be reached this way but not enough with this method alone. You are going to have to show quite a few in the middle they HAVE to vote you way. If you don't someone else will at least convince them to sit out or worse oppose you.

Lobbyists are very good at getting the most out of what you give them to work with. Logic, reason, and even a few Billion in new revenue will only get us so far. Even that might not be enough given the multiple layers of opposition against us.

But a true grassroots organization with proven muscle changes the game in many ways and allows those top tier Lobbyists and consultants jobs much easier. Right now they are running the show because "we the members" and the PPA's lack of confidence in us has them make the lobbyists work too hard at the basics.

If we showed some strength as an organization, we allow them to put their best talents to work with the most advantage. Right now, we have a racecar sitting in traffic in first gear in terms of lobbying talent. We members could empower that magnificent car by giving it new road to travel.

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I do also believe, however, that motivating and involving our members even more will happen in the future.

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I am sure it will, it almost has to for us to move forward in something less than first gear.

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I personally would like the PPA to also involve itself more in litigation (like the ACLU and NRA do also), and have already communicated my specific ideas regarding that to TE. Having a central resource to help defend poker players in Court would be a great asset, both to the members and in terms of positive publicity.

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This is a very good way to show another tangible benefit of membership. This helps over-come the "what have you done to deserve my annual membership renewal" objections.

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As to taxes, I still dont see the urgency there; the Wexler bill is tax neutral for us, the Frank bill anticipates new taxes, but nothing specific is in there yet ... I dont think it a smart move to turn our back on Barney (especially since he is the "freedom" guy as opposed to the "skill games are different" guy) just because onerous taxes might be later proposed.

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Politically these bills are going to change as they go through committee and hearings. They are only the outlines of future legislation. They may currently be the upper limit of what the PPA and board feels is possible given the level of commitment out of your average members.

IMO we can and must try to do better. We may not get tax help, and it may be over reaching to expect it for sure. However, we need to also help the organization. We can continue to play defense and hope to get back to pre-UIGEA and not have to eat a ton regulation in the process. Nevertheless, if we are stronger we can move our "core" wishes and put the opposition on defense by making some offensive moves. Let them fight this battle on our terms not we theirs.

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The PPA did move, and moved pretty good, with the help of its local Rep Randy, to respond to the MA casino bill hypocracy ... that effort continues, so what else exactly should the PPA do D$D? I like the idea of more "grassroots" movement in general, but what are you specifically suggesting?

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I'll give you some examples of out of the box suggestions I've made that I think would have made a difference not only in terms of organization but actual cost savings.

Bumper stickers. I'm a campaign guy I was shocked that I could not even buy a bumper sticker on the web-site. I found a poker friendly printer and we designed and had printed 10,000 bumper stickers at near cost. I had hoped a good portion of them would have been on cars in KY. They could have put 500 of them on the website for sale at about $3.00 and if they sold most of them paid for the entire lot. We would have also made a visible presence just getting them on cars in KY.

Poker Chips. Grasshopp3r got a nice design idea going on this forum and had me carry the ball. Because the Million Chip March idea was seen as not politically viable as Ney got chips I suggested because of the price I negotiated that we have printed some commemorative chips and perhaps some chipsets to use at the Fly-in. IMO if you had auctioned off just half of them as autographed sets for even just the normal retail of lesser quality chip-sets you would have made money and still had a few chipsets left over. In the end the person responsible for the chips for just the pro players and Congressmen failed, and there was a scramble to just get chips for that small "big" game.

I would have used the contacts I had made to hold at least two MTT's as at least one should have included everyone who took the trouble to fly-in. As it was the "big kids" went off to the big game and the rest of us were on our own. I had chips, tables, cards, dealers, and people trained to run MTT events for up to 500 people.

In less than a week of effort, I had all manner of volunteers and resources, some may not have been needed, but I do know from having attended the event that the PPA paid for a number of things they could have had free. I know John was busy at this time and perhaps thought I was talking out of my rear about what could have been done, but facts are facts.

Fundraising. You could have any of the pros show up almost any night in this area and hold a PPA fund raising event and get a minimum of 200~300 new dues paying members. You would not even need major cash prizes. You had time to run at least 2 of these with a little planning during this fly-in. You have pros in town for the up coming Judiciary hearings you could set up to pull these off on a regular basis by now.

PPA Store. I have a couple of contacts that would run a "no touch" Store for the PPA. Given some of the item prices I was able to dig up, most of the time the store even using up to a 1/3 of the items for giveaways for other grassroots events would be close to break-even. Find the right person to employ and this becomes a potential profit center.

Organization. You empower through training the State Reps. You teach them how to motivate the troops. You give them a budget of items from the store or donations in kind to hold events linked to specific goals. For example Mass. If Randy has a few trinkets and the necessary contacts and help through training he could hold a training/organizing session and have a nice fun free poker event to reward the people who got involved. The next time he made the calls more people show up. From that he builds a core of people he knows he can count on. The combination of concrete action and spirit of fun builds an organization in MA that even Sen. Kennedy on the Senate Judiciary a Committee we have to go through would become aware of through his staffers.

KY. KY was the proving ground. You try out some of these ideas along with a couple of hundred too long to mention and create a training manual for State Reps for '08. Right now John's budget writing effort and concretely ability to demonstrate the value of the investment for grassroots would be a dream not a sales pitch based on hope. Between now and the first primaries you continue to refine that playbook and through training you know before the campaign season where you can make a difference. Your legislative lobbing efforts get magnified many fold. Greenberg and the consultants are not planning a Hill fight, but a national '08 strategy, looking at specific races on offense, not defense. They could be doing this with confidence not hope now.

Motivation. You create meaningful concrete visible efforts that are fun for the members. Fun is the key. You find creative ways to "reward" hard work of your volunteers. The biggie on Presidential Campaigns was always driving or even getting to ride in a Presidential motorcade, the next were the tarmac photo ops. There are thousands of ways to "reward" volunteers, as they are the backbone of your real strength.

Testing. You have to constantly test your troops. You have to get creative in constantly looking for excuses to see who is still engaged and can do the job. More importantly you have to test your State Reps. Sadly, to say I imagine some of them have been barely heard from. All need to be given the tools to be more productive than TE. Can you imagine what TE could accomplish with a little help? Yes some may need to be replaced. But they should be at least given the chance to excel first.

State Reps. You don't need 50 paid employees to keep an eye out for State legislation that might hurt us, that is a red herring. But you do need to train State Reps how to spot opportunities. Don Signore from Chicago is a prefect example. The PPA posted on its website his news story, but no one tried to get him or the bar league in question on the phone. I tracked down the league, as I had the nexus of a number of news stories posted on the PPA site, just to see if this activity was being done. I spoke to Don and John to see if we could get Don to the fly-in and make sure John had the Chicago paper's DC stringers to follow up on this "Mr Smith Goes to Washington" story. I even had to introduce Don to the Trib stringer.

It doesn't take much to get this ball rolling. With the proper motivation and a little campaign trash you'd would be amazed what your "average" person can do in politics. I know as there are people who have come up to me years later who got involved in an effort I was helping and told me they were amazed at what they accomplished. I am gratified to say some have become from raw political neophytes volunteers to campaign managers and very strong grassroots organizers.

As I've said there are two kinds of grassroots organizers the expensive and the ones who had to learn to "live off the land." We all want to be the well paid ones, but not all know how to get the most out of every buck they are given. Most of the time I've ended up having to raise the seed money for the ideas that ended up bringing in more then the initial investment just to prove the worth of my ideas, that approach sucks, but you often have to do it. There were people here willing to pay for the DC chips out of their own pocket just to make it happen. Why? Because someone asked them to step up.

It can be done. It takes hard work, but most of all a true sense of understanding the "care and feeding" of your volunteers. Volunteers are a strange group. They will follow you through hell, like hanging 100,000 door hangers in less than 3 days in the cold fall rain, knowing that because of the rain 3/4 of the people didn't show up, if you treat them right. In that, little adventure, there were people who showed up for a single 2 hour commitment and worked 10 or more hours all three days. I'm still very proud of that crew. But you misuse a volunteer core and that campaign HQ can get damn empty in a hurry.

IMO a concrete action that is seen as worthwhile and a spirit of having fun doing it are the keys. Figuring out creative rewards that don't cost a dime is the art.

Grassroots is not a job, it really is a religion.

D$D