Email message to campaign supporters:

As we begin a new year in our fight to restore our American heritage of liberty and justice for all, I wanted to take a moment to thank you for your past efforts in that cause in general, and your volunteer efforts in support of my recent run for the United States Senate in particular. Although we, of course, did not win the election, the accomplishments of the campaign were significant. 76,392 people voted for me – because of the ideas you and I share. Michiganders have not cast this many votes for a third party United States Senate candidate since 1994 when 128,117 people voted for Libertarian Jon Coon.

Generous support made it possible to:

* Post a billboard on I-96 that was seen daily by tens of thousands of commuters
* Produce cost-effective TV ads, broadcast on Comedy Central to millions of Michigan viewers, contrasting bi-partisan support for the Wall Street bailout with the Libertarian view that this wealth transfer from working people to rich businesses was a completely improper use of our money
* Create a dominating online presence, including: advertisements, a first-rate web page, a MeetUp.com group, coverage in online news articles and blogs, YouTube “viral videos,” interviews about the campaign with online broadcasters, and promotion on social networking sites
* Produce hundreds of bumper stickers, more than a thousand yard signs, and over 12,000 campaign cards distributed by volunteers, like you, to their neighbors

Your volunteer support inspired me to make campaign stops throughout the state, even including the Upper Peninsula and West Michigan. I had literature booths at the Ann Arbor Art Fair, the Hillsdale County Peace and Justice Festival, as well as at gun shows and other events too numerous to mention. I marched in the “Shields Lions Club Parade” and attended many campaign forums.

The visibility you made possible resulted in interviews on radio talk shows in Traverse City, Grand Rapids, Lansing, and Kalamazoo. I also received interviews on public TV in Mt. Pleasant, and taped short speeches that aired on local cable and public TV stations. Our campaign in fact had a sufficiently high profile that both Grand Rapids TV stations, WOOD and WZZM, interviewed me about being excluded from the senatorial debates.

In sum, your hard work and talents helped spread our message of personal freedom and individual responsibility to tens of thousand of liberty-minded voters. From the bottom of my heart I thank you.

Sincerely,

Scotty Boman

http://boman08.com

313-247-20520

Boman sent a second message looking ahead to 2009 and beyond:

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”

– Thomas Jefferson

The last election was, for me, both an enormous honor and a great, personal satisfaction. An honor because I was able to serve as the Libertarian Party of Michigan’s “standard-bearer,” top-of-ticket, US Senate candidate. And a personal satisfaction because my first real activism with the LPM – fifteen years ago – was in support of Jon Coon’s benchmark campaign

for that very same office. Obviously, neither of us won. Frankly, neither of us expected to. We merely hoped to carry the torch of liberty a little further down the road to light the way to a safer, freer, most prosperous future for us, our children, our country. We knew from the beginning that this would be a lifelong cause for, as most libertarians’ favorite president observed, the effort requires eternal commitment.

While there are many fronts in the battle, for me the focal point of the freedom movement is the Libertarian Party. The message I promoted throughout my campaign is the same one the LPM has been advancing since it was founded more than three and a half decades ago. Ours is, in fact, the oldest surviving minor party

in Michigan. I believe that is so precisely because of the power of our message of individual liberty and limited government. And it is why ours is the only minor party that consistently wins elections, even if only to local office. Indeed, in this last election two more Libertarians were elected, this time to the Ypsilanti Parks Commission

For these reasons – and others to numerous to include in this brief note – I strongly encourage you to become an active member of the Libertarian Party of Michigan.

If you happen to be among my “ticket-splitter” supporters who already belongs to one of the old parties, even as a precinct delegates, this is not a problem! You are still very much welcome to join with us in the LP, as well. Ron Paul, for instance, is both a Republican Congressman and a Life Member of the Libertarian Party.
As he said: “It is not against the law to participate in more than one political party.” (And I’ll add…“Yet.”)

As I mentioned, there are many ways of playing an active role in the movement to restore our American heritage. And I would like to invite you to one. On January 24 the Wayne County affiliate of the Libertarian Party of Michigan will be hosting the state party’s annual Liberty Fest awards banquet. I have included a link to information on that event (http://mi.lp.org/Shared%20Documents/LibertyFest.aspx) and a link to a party membership application for your convenience (http://mi.lp.org/Shared%20Documents/Join%20Us.aspx).

Thanks, again, for helping with my US Senate campaign. I hope to see and thank you personally at the Liberty Fest on January 24

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Posted to IPR by Paulie