Sierra Club Members: Who are the "bad" candidates?

[stopbush]

I want to send in my ballot soon, but I don't know who the stealth candidates are, ie: those candidates who are on the ballot and want to make immigration an issue.

Can anyone fill me in on this?

[Snow]

1. Read the bios -

it becomes obvious. Easiest way is to pick from amongst the nominating committee candidates. But if you look, a couple of the bios say something like "don't vote for me; vote for the nominating committee slate, and don't vote for Lamm, etc etc" I can't remember who the stealth bunch is but Lamm is one. Look for them cross-recommending each other. Also, there's a couple who list PETA recommendations in their bios - that's a giveaway. The stealth bunch also will sometimes list recommendations from a current board member - those current board members are the previous sneaks. Oh, and another tipoff - look at the date of when the candidate joined Sierra Club. Almost all the stealth bunch are new members.

[stopbush]

2. Thanks. I'll do it now. n/t

[iamjoy]

3. From MoveOn.org

http://www.groundswellsierra.org/rightwingfunding.php

[willmcw]

4. Stealth Candidates

Dick Lamm, Frank Morris, and David Pimentel are the three candidates for whom immigration reductionism is a central concept. Kim McCoy and Roy van de Hoek are also running on the same slate. The five candidates that the opposition is endorsing are Aumen, Karpf, O'Connell, Ranchod, and Renstrom.

Personally, I am voting for Dobson, Dorsey, Hanson, Karpf, and Ranchod becuause I think they are the ones who best support the grassroots of the club.

Vote your conscience.

[ldoolin]

5. Opinions are going to vary

IMHO the bad candidates are the five that Groundswell Sierra is endorsing, who want the club to continue to be controlled by the old guard and a BOD that votes in lockstep on all issues: Aumen, Karpf, O'Connell, Ranchod, and Renstrom.

MoveOn.org are either dupes or bought-and-paid-for DLCers and they endorsed the wrong slate of candidates in the Sierra Club election. They can forget about me sending them any more donations. Send your donations directly to Kerry and the other Democratic candidates, not to MoveOn.

Where the others stand:

Ed Dobson seems to be the only person that all sides agree is a good person who wants the club to accomodate all viewpoints, and to consider all issues in a fair manner without marginalizing any club faction. I'd definitely recommend voting for him regardless of who else you vote for.

Richard Lamm and Frank Morris are the only two who are expected to make immigration a main focus if elected to the board. Vote for them if you think immigration is an environmental issue the Sierra Club should take a position on, and don't vote for them if you don't think so.

Kim McCoy is an animal rights advocate who is expected to make veganism and opposition to hunting and fishing a main focus. If you agree, vote for her, if you don't agree, don't vote for her.

Robert Roy van de Hoek and Karyn Strickler support the "John Muir Sierrans" faction of the club, which wants the club to take stronger positions and to raise the bar for political endorsements. They are also critics of the club's old guard and friends of current board member Marcia Hanscom. If you agree, vote for them. If not, don't.

David Pimentel is a Cornell professor with a long and distinguished record of research on entomology, opposition to pesticides, and overpopulation as it relates to ecological carrying capacity. His work has been frequently cited in he past in Sierra Club reports. He has been unfairly lumped in with Morris and Lamm on the immigration issue, but if elected he is not expected to make it a priority. He is definitely worth consideration even if you don't think Lamm and Morris are.

Current board members Paul Watson and Ben Zuckerman are known to be advocates of both animal rights and immigration reform, which is where the bizarre accusations that "outside groups" are on the verge of taking over the club are coming from. Do the math. Watson + Zuckerman + McCoy = 3 animal rights advocates out of 15; Watson + Zuckerman + LaFollette + Lamm + Morris = 5 immigration reform advocates out of 15; Hanscom + Force + van de Hoek + Strickler = 4 "John Muir Sierrans" out of 15. Takeover? No, it's merely making sure that the Sierra Club BOD reflects all viewpoints within the club, instead of a BOD entirely consisting of "old guard" members who vote in lockstep. The only thing they would all vote as a bloc on is defending democracy in the Sierra Club, which is more than be said for the Groundswell slate (who are the ones who tried to

The other nominated candidates not mentioned are part of the old guard, but may still merit consideration since they weren't endorsed by Groundswell.

Finally, Phil Berry, Morris Dees, and Barbara Herz are fake petition candidates who aren't even seriously running, they only ran so they smear the other petition candidates with their ballot statements. They don't want your vote to begin with, but I wouldn't bother reading their ballot statements either.

I personally voted a split ticket, but not for any of the five that Groundswell endorsed.

[willmcw]

6. Re: "Opinions are going to vary"

Idoolin,

I don't know how closely you follow the Sierra Club's BOD, but your analysis is incomplete.

To begin with, Hanscom, Force, LaFollette, Watson, and Zuckerman may have different priorites but they vote together as a bloc. Since Lamm, Morris, Pimentel, McCoy, and van de Hoek are running as a slate, and since they are each closely allied to incumbents, I would expect that they would likewise vote together with their allies. Thus if all five were elected, they would have a majority of ten. Indeed, only three need to be elected in order to form a majority.

Furthermore you are misjudging Pimentel's record. Though he now claims to have no opinion on immigration, he has served on the boards of explicitly anti-immigration organizations such as the so-called "Diversity Alliance for a Sustainable America," <http://www.diversityalliance.org/docs/DASA-MissionPlatform.html> the "Carrying Capapcity Network," and the anti-semitic journal "Population and Ecology." He may claim to not have an opinion at the moment, but he have worked on behalf of those who do have strong opinions.

As an insightful article in the progressive newspaper "The L.A. Weekly" pointed out recently <http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/19/features-zakin.php>, the immigration reductionists are the true old-guard, using their money to try to turn the clock back to a time when the Sierra Club explicitly supported immigration reduction. The Sierra Club also, long ago, used to bar Jews and Blacks from membership. Thankfully both policies are in the past. Unfortunately, this well-financed group is trying to resurrect one of those policies.

The slate headed by Lamm, Morris, and Pimentel are not reformers. They have never attended Sierra Club meetings and don't know the diffeence between a group and a chapter, or between EPEC and EVEC. Rather, they are the Know Nothing party of the 21st Century, stealth candidates who feign ignorance when questioned. Paul Watson himself has stated that he intended a takeover and he has endorsed the Lamm slate.

While the slate endorsed by Groundswell Sierra is not perfect, they are the best chance the progressive members of the Sierra Club have of beating back this takeover attempt by anti-progresive outsiders. I urge every thoughtful member to vote to defeat Lamm, Morris, and Pimentel.

Sincerely,
Will McWhinney
Life Member

[ldoolin]

7. Re: "Opinions are going to vary"

As I stated in another post, Hanscom, Watson, LaFollette, Force, and Zuckerman do not vote as a bloc, and any look at the minutes of the Sierra Club BOD meetings will confirm this. It is Fahn, McGrady, O'Connell, Catlin, Aumen, Cox, Ferenstein, Wells, and Zaleha who vote as a bloc. Ed Dobson is an independent voice along with Hanscom, Watson and the others.

The only thing Hanscom, Watson, LaFollette, Force, and Zuckerman vote as a bloc on is the important issue of protecting club democracy and defending the right of all different viewpoints to be treated fairly within the club, and to have a voice on the Board of Directors. And it is precisely the other nine who predictably vote as a bloc against club democracy and against fair representation on the board for all viewpoints.

It's too bad that the Sierra Club took their BOD minutes off their website, but I do have a copy of one of the recent meetings and can post how all the board members voted to illustrate my point. Otherwise I'd point interested readers here to the BOD minutes so you can see for yourself.

Re: Pimentel serving on the board of DASA and CCN: So what? That means that he accepts the traditional environmentalist position that immigration levels should be set in terms of long-term ecological carrying capacity and stabilizing the population, a position held by every single major reputable ecologist and environmental activist, including Dave Foreman, Lester Brown, Brock Evans, Garrett Hardin, Stuart Udall, David Brower, Edward Abbey, Paul Ehrlich, and others too numerous to list here. A position that the leadership of the Sierra Club suddenly decided during the wave of post-modernism and political correctness that swept across the left during the 1990s to abandon.

Furthermore, his statements on the Sierra Club's election website indicate that even though he does hold the environmentalist position on immigration rather than the post-modernist position, he does not have the intention of pushing the immigration issue or making it a priority. Pimentel: "Currently, I hold a neutral position on immigration. I feel that there are far more important and pressing environmental problems than immigration, including pesticides, soil erosion, water pollution, air pollution, energy conservation, and protecting forests."

The Sierra Club leadership could have avoided this whole controversy that is going on right now had they simply not tampered with the club's longstanding position on immigration, and left in place their 1989 resolution that immigration into the U.S. should be no more than that which would allow for the stabilization of U.S. population to zero population growth. Instead, they chose to tamper with their immigration position, impose a gag rule that nobody could talk about immigration while identifying themselves as a member of the Sierra Club, while secretly stacking the national population committee with members of pro-open borders groups, disciples of cornucopian anti-environmentalist Betsy Hartmann, and supporters of ultra-leftist fringe groups like the "Political Ecology Group." That was the real outside takeover, it was done by stealth, and it was rather despicable. If the Sierra Club is being torn apart right now, they have nobody but themselves to blame for this.

Re: Your calling the journal Population and Ecology "anti-semitic": Anyone can call anything any name they want. Where's the evidence? A lot of people such as those who frequent anti-Palestinean chat boards call Democratic Underground "anti-semitic" too, but where's the evidence?

You: "The Sierra Club also, long ago, used to bar Jews and Blacks from membership"

You mean Blacks like Frank Morris and Jews like Ben Zuckerman? And what does this have to do with the Sierra Club adopting a policy on an ecologically sound level of legal immigration into the U.S. to begin with? Limiting immigration into the U.S. was the dominant view of 1970s ecologists and was based on population and carrying capacity concerns. Barring Blacks and Jews from membership was based on racism and was - what, back in the 1910s? How is that even relevant today or to this issue?

Re: Your calling the L.A. Weekly "progressive", and Groundswell the "progressive" candidates: A good way to ensure that I will regard somebody with suspicion is if they go around proclaiming themselves as a "progressive". Here's an example: "Americans for Jobs, Health Care, and Progressive Values", the ones linked to Gephardt whose only purpose for existing was to run attack ads against Howard Dean. The leftist anti-environmentalist Betsy Hartmann calls herself a "progressive". If they're progressives, I guess that makes me a liberal instead.

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Now let's look, instead, at who the five that Groundswell endorsed are, and why Groundswell might have picked those five. First, Groundswell raised a big stink about an alleged outside takeover, but then they endorsed five candidates and purposely excluded the other three nominated candidates from their endorsement. They did this once the big stink had already been raised and the media had bought into it.

And what do those three nominated candidates that Groundswell didn't endorse - Ed Dobson, Michael Dorsey, and Chad Hanson - have in common? Past affiliation with the John Muir Sierrans, that's what! Furthermore, the Groundswell leaders are the very same people who several years ago circulated letters in opposition to Dorsey, Hanson, and other JMS people getting elected to the board, and they used the same scare tactics that they used today: An "outside takeover", "extreme concern for the viability of the club", and so on. Groundswell Sierra is beginning to look a lot more like a pathetic attempt to use immigration and SUSPS as a cover for their real agenda, which is to go after their real target, the John Muir Sierrans, and exclude *any* group representing a dissident viewpoint within the club, whether JMS, SUSPS, Sea Shepherd, or anyone else, from leadership positions in the club.

Here are the five people that Groundswell did endorse, and the years they joined the club:
Lisa Renstrom - 1994
Dave Karpf - 1995
Nick Aumen - 1988
Sanjay Ranchod - 1994
Jan O'Connell - 1976

Notable that every single one of these candidates except for Jan O'Connell joined the Sierra Club *after* I did, and yet the candidates I support, which I see as taking the genuine ecological positions that I *thought* the Sierra Club was solid on when I joined, are supposed to be an "outside takeover"? I find it preposterous that people who joined the club after I did, and are now running for the BOD so they can advocate for positions and alliances that I oppose, are going to try and dictate to me who the outsiders are, especially in light of this:

Roy van de Hoek - joined 1992
David Pimentel - joined 1992
Frank Morris - joined 1998
Dick Lamm - first joined in the 1960s, rejoined 2003 after a lapsed membership

Which is the real outside takeover here?

Sanjay Ranchod has been to two Sierra Club meetings in his entire life, and those two was so he could solicit support for his campaign for the BOD. Anyone who brings up that Pimentel, Lamm, and Morris haven't been to Sierra Club meetings should be aware of that fact.

Nick Aumen and fake candidate Phil Berry were behind the attempt in 1999 to gut club democracy by making it more difficult for members to get resolutions on the ballot. This move was rightly opposed by many club leaders and reformers including David Brower, and was rightly rejected by the membership. That was unforgivable and speaks volumes about Aumen's fitness for club leadership.

Dave Karpf to Karyn Strickler: "I'm embarassed to even be on the same ballot as you." That tells me that Dave Karpf is an elitist, a snob with a sense of "entitlement" to be on the BOD. I would exclude him from consideration on that basis alone, regardless of the Groundswell endorsement.

One thing is certain, even if all the Groundswell candidates wind up getting elected this year, we will have won, because the behavior of Carl Pope, Larry Fahn, Lawrence Downing, and others during this election, and the use of many chapter newsletters to publish the Drusha Mayhue article in violation of club by-laws, has given us more than ample reason to see that they are removed from leadership in the club. And that is exactly what is going to happen once the media hoopla has died down and the election is over, no matter who wins.

As you yourself have undoubtedly seen on the Sierra Club email lists, there are a lot of people in the club angry at Groundswell for claiming to be a grassroots movement to fend off an outside takeover, while in reality using that as a cover for a stealth campaign against JMS. It's too bad MoveOn cannot see that and retract their endorsement of Groundswell. You're one of the few people within the club who is still defending them.