| Vol. IX, No. 7 | Editor: Robert Giedt | August 1999 |
Recently, both Jack Hickey (current Publicity Chair) and Margret Schmidt (current Treasurer) both announced their candidacies for the San Mateo County Community College District Board of Trustees election this November 2. There will be three seats available on the board, and we're hoping with some good word-of-mouth and tactical campaigning to grab two of them.
Our two candidates are also running to oppose the upcoming community college $148,000,000 bond measure on the ballot for November. This bond measure (slated for upgrades and repairs, new computer equipment, etc.) is ill-designed and is a complete mismanagement of funds that will put our children's children into heavy debt with its 25-year plan. Watch for it in November.
What we need to do now is to spread the word about Jack and Margret's campaigns. Since this is a non-partisan race where political affiliations are somewhat blurry, it gives us an advantage to lobby our friends that might not otherwise vote for a third party. If everyone can convince five of their friends to vote for Jack and Margret and ask them to pass it along, they stand a good chance to win. It's up to us!
Jack Hickey has been politically active since the 1960s, running for a number of offices in the past 20 years. He has also initiated several reform proposals over the years and has appeared on a number of local talk radio and television shows. Campaign contributions can be sent to: Hickey for CCD, 243 Ferndale Way, Emerald Hills, CA, 94062 or contact Jack directly at jackhick@cwnet.com. His Web site can be found at http://users.cwnet.com/jackhick/.
Margret Schmidt is currently a product development manager and received her Bachelors degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from UC Berkeley. She has sat on a number of real estate association and listing service committees and has chaired the operations board for her current employer. Margret has been the Treasurer of the San Mateo Libertarian Party since 1997. Visit her campaign Web site at http://home.pacbell.net/xschmidt/mbs/smc/.
When I went off to college in the autumn of 1976, one of the things I hoped to do while there was to learn about government and politics. The high school civics class had not made too much of an impression on me and that I was ignorant about politics.
Not too long after arriving at Stanford I came across National Review in the library. I was very impressed with the writing of William F. Buckley Jr. and figured I had found my home. I had my disagreements about some social issues such as religion and abortion, but I figured the Republican Party was the best political home I was going to find.
My first College Republicans meeting was a big let down for someone like me, still interested in ideas and issues, so I was open-minded when later I discovered what was then a fairly strong Libertarian group on campus. I found them extremely knowledgeable and extremely reasonable. They were very patient and considerate and polite and my ego had a tough time when I could see that their arguments were better-thought through than my own when we disagreed!
Ed Clark ran for California Governor in 1978, and I heard him speak when he visited the campus. Ed Clark impressed me tremendously, I was more than proud to be associated with people like him, and I have been a registered Libertarian ever since. Two years later Ed Clark ran for President with a millionaire on his ticket and received nearly 1,000,000 votes! Those were heady days, and I lived and breathed the Libertarian cause!
But then a good friend of mine who had been instrumental in converting me to libertarianism left to join the Reagan campaign. After the successful campaign, he went off to work for Reagan in the White House, and I too graduated college and moved on. I found myself focusing on my career and for the most part only sporadically paid attention to the Libertarian Party.
About a year ago I started paying attention again and decided to see if I could get more involved. I attended one of the LPSM business meetings, found the ideas and camaraderie that I had been missing for so long and decided to volunteer to be Membership Chair of the LPSM. Now I'm hoping to convince others to spend more time with us and help us transition to the system of self-government. The timing has been good, as the LP is definitely picking up steam. I look forward to meet even more local San Mateo Libertarians as we work on local issues, the year 2000 elections and beyond.
SACRAMENTOAugust 2, 1999The Libertarian Party of California has voted to endorse a referendum campaign to repeal the "assault weapons" legislation recently signed into law by Governor Gray Davis, the party announced today.
The campaign, known as Veto the Governor, is being spearheaded by San Francisco radio talk show host Geoff Metcalf of Hot Talk KSFO 560-AM. If successful, the referendum would repeal SB 23 by Senator Don Perata (D-Alameda), which Davis signed on July 19. Among other provisions, that bill enhances California's existing "assault weapons" laws by outlawing certain types of firearms based on their physical characteristics, such as those with "a pistol grip that protrudes conspicuously" and "a thumbhole stock."
"The Libertarian Party of California is proud to support Geoff Metcalf's effort to remove this bad law from the books," declared Libertarian state chair Mark Hinkle. "This campaign may be unpopular with some, but it is the right thing to do, and Libertarians will work hard to make sure this question gets on the ballot."
According to Hinkle, endorsing Metcalf's referendum was a "slam-dunk" for Libertarians. "The Libertarian Party is the only party that believes in individual freedom of choice on all issues at all times. We will defend the Second Amendment as staunchly as the First, Fourth, or Tenth. We'd be compromising our principles if we didn't participate when an opportunity like this comes along."
The "Veto the Governor" campaign is a natural for Libertarians to make an impact. "We are a grassroots
organization consisting of intelligent, hard-working, principled individuals who want to make a difference," Hinkle pointed out. "Mr. Metcalf has stated that he wants to wage a grassroots campaign, and Libertarians are experts at that."
To qualify for the March 7, 2000, primary ballot, the referendum campaign must submit 419,260 signatures from valid registered voters by October 19. According to the Secretary of State, 39 referenda have qualified for the ballot since 1912, 25 of which were successful.
"We know it's a long shot, but it's one we have to take," Hinkle noted. "If we do nothing, we will have already lost. Our goal is to send a message to Sacramento: stop telling us how to live our lives and start letting us make decisions for ourselves."
The July meeting at Hobee's marked the end of the 'slow' phase of the election cycle and the beginning of the months when we do the 'real work' of a political party. Highlights only are summarized here.
Jack Hickey declared that he has entered the race for the board of trustees that governs the county community college district, in response to their recently demonstrated desire to plunge the district into debt and to raise property taxes. The district has no bonds outstanding at present and county property tax revenues are at an all-time high. Their decision and timing are odd, to say the least! Subsequent to the meeting, Margret Schmidt announced that she has joined Jack in the board race. (Three of the five seats are up for election in November of this year.)
We voted unanimously to endorse Jack's candidacy and to oppose the community college district bond measure. Two drafts of ballot language were presented and your secretary was charged with revising one of them for submission to the county.
Jack introduced George Cresson, of the newly formed San Mateo County Taxpayers Union. George was entertaining and informativesharing his positive experiences in local politics and in stopping another recently attempted bond issue. George came to our dinner to recruit for the SMCTU, which is non-partisan in purpose. He seeks to expand participation beyond the core group, which draws heavily on Republicans he knows (as past chair of that party's central committee). The budding group doesn't have a formal membership yet, but he'd like to hear from anyone interested in getting involved at 650/483-6146 or Cressons@AOL.com.
Last month we voted to mail two initiative petitions to registered Libertarians. Subsequently, promised copies of one of the petitions didn't arrived in time for us to prepare and mail them soon enough to beat the submission deadline. At this month's meeting we voted to officially cancel that mailing. It turned out that the LPC sent the same petitions to our membership anyway.
We decided to combine J.R.'s membership mailing with the candidate petition mailing in October.
Frank Adam has requested some help with candidate recruitment. If you're interested in running for office or you know a libertarian who might be persuaded, please contact Frank! One's participation can be as minimal as doing the paperwork to get on the ballot or as ambitious as attending all candidate panels and engaging in other forms of campaigning. There are races for all types of candidate.
The Schmidts were authorized to purchase some materials for the October candidate petition mailing.
Lacy Nelson observed that some regions split their "supper club" and "business meeting" functions into separate events. The present format is convenient for officers, but we'd like to hear from any members who would be more likely to attend a supper club dinner if it were not connected with our regular business meeting. You can contact Lacy (or any officer) as indicated in the masthead.
The Marin region of the LP has invited any SMLP members to their Millennium Cruise and Dinner to be held on August 14. They will be meeting at the Tiburon Ferry at 1:30pm for a cruise around the Bay, then they'll meet at 4pm for dinner at the Mill Valley Masonic Lodge (19 Corte Madera Avenue in Mill Valley$10/plate).
For complete details, please contact the Marin region LP at 415/339-7887.
Wednesday, August 18
Hobee's Restaurant
(Directions to Hobee's)
1111
Shoreway Road, Belmont; just off Ralston, on the bay side of Highway 101
Dinner
and informal discussion (optional): 6:00--7:30pm in the reserved dining room
Business meeting: 7:30--8:45pm in the dining room alcove.
| "When the representative body have lost the confidence of their
constituents, when they have notoriously made sale of their most valuable
rights, when they have assumed to themselves powers which the people never put
into their hands, then, indeed, their continuing in office becomes dangerous to
the State, and calls for an exercise of the power of dissolution." --Thomas Jefferson, 1774 |