theknightshift
11-15-2007, 02:18 PM
So a few days ago I wrote here about how some folks have been wanting me to run for Congress here in the North Carolina 13th district (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=34719). Long story short: I posted on my blog last week that I didn't know if I was ready for something like that. And if I did, it would not be a regular House campaign: there would be no negative ads at all (if I ran one, I promised never to run for office again), no PAC money, if I won it would only be for 3 terms and then come home, etc.
Over this past weekend I decided to make an experiment of it, and see how far could a regular guy get in running for Congress. And that's what I spent the past few days doing: even going so far as to change my registration from independent to Republican (even though George W. Bush and his kind have really soured me on being a registered Republican again, 'cuz that's what I was before becoming independent) and filing what we thought was the paperwork for this. Except it turns out that it should have been paperwork with the FEC, not your local board of elections...
As of today I can report that the results of that experiment is: not very far at all.
It requires a HUGE commitment of resources to even begin to consider running for Congress. To file with the FEC you must have raised $5000 already. I didn't have to worry about that with the local campaign last year (which is where this whole "hey run for Congress next!" thing got started).
To legally get THAT amount of money, you must first have an "exploratory committee" set up. That's what you first start getting your money to run from. And here's where I got bogged-down this go-round: it really, really meant a lot to me that if I did this, that it not be "me" motivating it. I said I would do this if enough support was out there for it. The people who have told me they would give me that, I'm very thankful for. But in terms of the amount that the Federal Election Commission is demanding...
...I don't want to ask people for the mandated support for this if it's not already there. It can't be a "me" thing at all. And that's why the thought of setting up an exploratory committee isn't very attractive to me right now. I said I'd do it if people wanted me. And I was willing to file the paperwork to "legally" say that I'm considering it. But when it comes to seeking federal office, you can't even say that you're officially considering it without raising money first, in order to get the support you want.
It's a Catch-22.
I would have seriously loved being able to do this. The commercials that I did last year for my school board run (BTW E! Television's hit show THE SOUP ran my first one this past week (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51FpFrMVWOo) :)), those were all fun to do and I had a lot of even better commercials on the drawing board, if I was able to run for Congress this time. Doesn't look like that's going to happen now...
But that's okay. I told God that whatever was His will, that I would be happy with it. And this hasn't been a wasted experience at all: I learned a lot even from "putting the feelers" out like this. It's now my hope and prayer that someone else out there will see what I did, even though I haven't gotten far this time, and will have an idea of what to do now and to run with it on their own :)
Over this past weekend I decided to make an experiment of it, and see how far could a regular guy get in running for Congress. And that's what I spent the past few days doing: even going so far as to change my registration from independent to Republican (even though George W. Bush and his kind have really soured me on being a registered Republican again, 'cuz that's what I was before becoming independent) and filing what we thought was the paperwork for this. Except it turns out that it should have been paperwork with the FEC, not your local board of elections...
As of today I can report that the results of that experiment is: not very far at all.
It requires a HUGE commitment of resources to even begin to consider running for Congress. To file with the FEC you must have raised $5000 already. I didn't have to worry about that with the local campaign last year (which is where this whole "hey run for Congress next!" thing got started).
To legally get THAT amount of money, you must first have an "exploratory committee" set up. That's what you first start getting your money to run from. And here's where I got bogged-down this go-round: it really, really meant a lot to me that if I did this, that it not be "me" motivating it. I said I would do this if enough support was out there for it. The people who have told me they would give me that, I'm very thankful for. But in terms of the amount that the Federal Election Commission is demanding...
...I don't want to ask people for the mandated support for this if it's not already there. It can't be a "me" thing at all. And that's why the thought of setting up an exploratory committee isn't very attractive to me right now. I said I'd do it if people wanted me. And I was willing to file the paperwork to "legally" say that I'm considering it. But when it comes to seeking federal office, you can't even say that you're officially considering it without raising money first, in order to get the support you want.
It's a Catch-22.
I would have seriously loved being able to do this. The commercials that I did last year for my school board run (BTW E! Television's hit show THE SOUP ran my first one this past week (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51FpFrMVWOo) :)), those were all fun to do and I had a lot of even better commercials on the drawing board, if I was able to run for Congress this time. Doesn't look like that's going to happen now...
But that's okay. I told God that whatever was His will, that I would be happy with it. And this hasn't been a wasted experience at all: I learned a lot even from "putting the feelers" out like this. It's now my hope and prayer that someone else out there will see what I did, even though I haven't gotten far this time, and will have an idea of what to do now and to run with it on their own :)