Thursday, March 3, 2011

LP Message: Shall we spend $30k for "Republica​n Wall of Shame" ad?

Dear Friend of Liberty,

We have an incredible opportunity thanks to a generous $10,000 gift from an angry donor.

He's so mad about the people listed on our "Republican Wall of Shame" that he gave us $10,000 if we would run an ad with the Republican Wall of Shame in the Washington Post.

He wants everyone to know what lying hypocrites those Republican politicians are.

We've already received his $10,000 check.

The problem is, Washington Post ads are really expensive. A full-page color ad in the main news section costs $92,000, a half-page costs $50,773, and a quarter-page costs $29,835. (We're not going to run anything smaller than a quarter-page ad in the print version.)

I'm hoping you will donate a few hundred dollars, or $1,000, and perhaps another very generous donor will contribute $10,000 to get us close to the $30,000 we need to run the print ad.

In the unfortunate event we cannot even raise $30,000, we did find a good $15,000 package that involves advertising in the Washington Post online. With online ads, we can link directly to our website, where we can provide more details, encourage people to join the Libertarian Party, and ask them to donate so we can run the ad in more places.

I hope we'll be able to afford a print ad, but an online ad would be worthwhile too.

Can you at least help us raise $5,000 so we can run the online ad? Normally with a donor offering $10,000, we would hope to quickly match his donation with another $10,000. But I'm asking you to at least help us raise $5,000 -- that way, we can at least run an online ad.

Please go to our website and make a generous donation to help expose the hypocrisy of these prominent Republicans.

Type "wall of shame ad" in the comments section at the bottom.

Please note that Congressman Ron Paul did NOT qualify for our Republican Wall of Shame. That's because Congressman Paul, who was our 1988 Libertarian Party nominee for President, adheres to the Constitution and votes against bailouts, tax increases, and wars.

We may tweak the ad to fit the space, and of course we'll add text encouraging people to join the LP, but basically the content will be what you see here. We won't add any other people to this Republican Wall of Shame ad, even though many others deserve to be on it.

We displayed a big 4-by-6-foot version of the "Republican Wall of Shame" at our CPAC booth recently and it was a big hit, attracting lots of attention. It was specifically designed to separate small-government libertarians from the Republican Party, and attract them to the Libertarian Party.

There's a catch.

I told our $10,000 donor that I thought we could raise at least $5,000 more. If we can't raise at least $5,000 more for this ad, I'll call the donor and ask him if he wants us to return his check -- and if we do, we'll also give that opportunity to every other donor for this ad. My deadline for raising $5,000 is this Friday, March 4 at I will keep you posted about the progress at LP.org.

Do you think this ad is a bad idea? You've got the opportunity to tell us that below in our poll.

I can't promise you what effect this ad will have. Sometimes you just want to stand up and speak truth to power, point your finger directly at the politicians, and expose them for the liars and hypocrites they are. This ad will definitely let you do that, focused right here in the Washington, DC area.

Also, spending money on ads in a major newspaper shows the press and public how serious we are. I want the press to see we're hitting hard at the Republican hypocrites who have track records of growing government.

If you're mad as hell and don't want to take it anymore, you can take action here.

If you donate at least $500, we'll list your name in the ad if you ask us to. Tell us in the comments section when you donate.

If we raise $5,000-$19,000, we'll run the online ads. If we raise $20,000, we'll go for a quarter-page print ad. If we raise $82,000, we'll go for the full-page ad. (Note, the maximum you can donate in a calendar year is $30,800.)

Please donate now, and type "wall of shame ad" in the comments section. Also please forward this note to your friends and ask them to donate.

And please tell us what you think about this plan by responding to our poll.

Sincerely,

Wes Benedict
Executive Director
Libertarian National Committee

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