Liberty MavenRon Paul Revolution Money Bomb Hero Speaks Out
June 7th, 2008 12:39 am | by Marc Gallagher | Published in Activism, Election, Fund Raising, History, Liberty, Maven Commentary, Philosophy, Politics, Ron Paul, Video | 6 Comments
Many people think that Trevor Lyman was the man behind the Ron Paul “Money Bomb” idea due to him being in the media following the November 5th event. The fact is that James Sugra is the man who came up with the idea, and he let Trevor create the web site and promote it.
He recently posted an uplifting message and video on Ron Paul Forums about his experience during that November 5th time frame.
James writes:
The cause is not the affect it is the reason. This is my 26th video for the Ron Paul movement. To think it all started 8 months ago back in October. I thought of an idea it was pretty simple. I proposed the first mass donation video for Ron Paul on a controversial day November 5th. I didn’t know how many supporters would actually donate and I had no clue how much to make the donation. After reviewing all the various sites the numbers came to mind. 100,000 patriots donating 100 dollars a piece. It was a long shot to say the least. I was so broke I couldn’t even afford to donate myself. I am ashamed to admit that but it’s true.
All my credit cards had been maxed out I just started a new job that was 100% commission. I thought if I couldn’t donate maybe there was someone out there that could and that was my driving force. I only needed to reach one person and if that person believed in my idea they could take it to the next level. I met someone by the name of Ronpaulmeetupvideos on YouTube AKA Trevor Lyman.
He said he created a website for the idea. I knew it needed something more because many people were posting on the original video asking; I am in but who else is going to donate? Trevor Lyman became the general of this idea and I respect him for all his efforts even if some people don’t give him the credit he deserves. His site built so much excitement and was an awesome grassroots effort from so many people.
One week until November 5th I learned some shocking news that would change my life forever. My father passed away 9 years ago when I was 18 years old. His birthday was on November 5th. To many November 5th is a historic day because what we accomplished. To me it was a tribute to the man who taught me everything I know. I feel he empowered me to think of the idea and I may not be religous but I became spiritual. Ron Paul had restored my faith in my country but my father would restore my faith in believing in myself.
On November 10th I was recognized by the New York times as the creator of the movement. I remember that day like it was yesterday. I also remember the lady from the New York Times telling me congratulations. I had no idea my name would be published in the main lead story in the NYT “The Web finds it’s Candidate and takes him for a ride”. That day my name would appear on every major internet site Yahoo, MSN, AOL and many other sites.
I did not do all the media interviews and gain RP celebrity status for a reason. I felt there were to many people to thank. Being recognized was enough for me and I didn’t need to do all the interviews. You would all laugh if you new all the people who contacted me Newt Gingrich’s director of fundraising David Kelley even contacted me to help with their non prophit organiztion (Not Happening). I learned information directly from the Ron Paul campaign and how they new November 5th was alive from day one but never recognized it because the controversy.
I never did get my phone call from Ron Paul. However I did get an opportunity to meet him at the Simi Valley Debate after rally. I drove for 3 hours with some of my meetup friends and Ron Paul was only shaking peoples hands not giving out autographs. I walked up to Ron Paul and told him who I was and a staff member pulled me aside. Ron signed my article from November 10th and he said this. It’s ideas like these that make it all worth while and he thanked me. I did an interview with the campaign and then cruised around in the Ron Paul limo for about an hour.
One of the staffers graciously took off his VIP pass and handed it to Carol Paul. She signed it and handed it to me. The staffer thanked me for my efforts and I never felt more appreciated in my life. Why? I am nobody I am your average Joe who had been beaten down in life from tragedy, disappointment and for one day on November 5th I accomplished something great. The old sang is true never doubt that a committed group of individuals can change the world.
It does not matter who I am or what I did. What matters now is you become the person with the next great idea. So many people have contacted me trying to get me to promote their Ron Paul ideas which saddens me. I know that if they don’t have the courage to stand up for what they believe in we will never win. From one patriot to another find your calling and make the most of it.
Here is his video promoting the upcoming Revolution March and the money bomb day to raise money for the event. Please consider donating to fund the march on June 14th, during the Flag Day money bomb.
June 7th, 2008 at 10:38 pm (#)
This is the biggest load of bunk I have heard of yet. No one person made the money bomb happen. Ok, so one guy thought of it, but thousands upon thousands of us out here in the land of the unperson made it happen. I know thousands of people who worked on the money bomb day and night for weeks on end to make it a big success. They sent out untold numbers of emails, wrote articles, called people, made fliers and passed them around, they told friends in Meetup groups about the big day, they spread the word any way they could, and when those people contacted people, the people they contacted told other people. We had people from around the globe contributing that day.
A money bomb is only as successful as the people who executed all the work it took to make it work, and believe me, it took a lot of work.
You might as well take credit for thinking up the idea of getting a candidate money for his campaign. Yeah, great job, genius. Now, how the hell are you going to pull that off?
This is like that South Park episode. Step one: Steal underpants. Step Two: _______ Step Three: Profits!!!!
At least this is better than Trevor Lyman getting credit for doing anything. On a certain website, if you do a search for the issue you will see that many people offered to put together a website to help this thing get going, Trevor was just the first to do it.
No one person deserves credit for the money that Ron Paul raised in the months of November and December 2007. Not even Ron Paul. It was a joint effort and all of his supporters and lovers of liberty deserve the kudos, not some whiny little twit.
This is the thing that no one understood and they still don’t. The Ron Paul phenomenon was truly a revolution. There was no top down management. There were hundreds and then thousands and then tens of thousands of people willing to devote their lives to help the cause and gather others to join the force, but no one person can take credit for anything. That is why the other campaigns could not duplicate the money bombs no matter how hard they tried. They did not have what Ron Paul had: loyal and devoted supporters by the tens of thousands.
Oh sure, there were some people who worked harder than others, but I give a lot more credit to the folks who spent 90 hours a week spreading the word about the money bomb than the guy who thought of the idea. And he doesn’t say word one about all those people who worked so hard to make November 5, 2007 a huge success. Shame on him.
June 8th, 2008 at 1:01 am (#)
Every single individual deserves recognition and acclaim for what they did and continue to do for their country. Trevor, James, and jeffiner44, you are truly heroes.
June 8th, 2008 at 1:19 pm (#)
jeffiner44 says:
“And he doesn’t say word one about all those people who worked so hard to make November 5, 2007 a huge success.”
James wrote:
“His site built so much excitement and WAS AN AWSOME GRASSROOTS EFFORT FROM SO MANY PEOPLE.”
I think James addressed the efforts of the many in the above quote. Your whole tantrum was based on the fact that you didnt READ the story with an open mind. Shame on you.
June 10th, 2008 at 4:17 am (#)
What open mind is there to have? Either one individual deserves credit for these money bombs or not. In this case, it wasn’t as if some guy came to a bunch of Ron Paul supporters with a whole campaign for how to make money online and asked for help pulling it off with a fixed, well designed and thought out plan. All that happened was some guy said let’s raise some money on one day and others said, yeah cool, and others said I can help and in a matter of about 4 hours dozens of individuals had pitched in ideas of how to make this successful, others started working on spreading the message and through the WORK of thousands of people the money bomb was created.
This article comes across as sour grapes for Trevor getting all of the credit (which I agree he deserves none of) but then seeking credit for himself.
You miss the whole point of the campaign when you give credit to one individual for this. Every day people came up with ideas for how to deal with getting shut out of debates, people wrote articles to counter all the mis-information being spewed by the MSM, people set up charity donation drives. The grassroots was busy every single minute working on different ways to get Ron Paul elected.
But don’t you get it? It is the idea of liberty that was so successful not any one individual. The concept of freedom was what brought in the money, not some guy. You could hire this exact same person to repeat the performance for other politicians and it couldn’t get done. That is because it was not the idea of raising money on one particular day that brought in the money, it was the lust for liberty and freedom brought on by the starving and hopeless and disenfranchised.
Do you folks realize that many of the people that donated sold everything they had to give money to the Paul campaign? People maxed out credit cards for donations just on the hope that perhaps someone out there might bring them a little bit of liberty.
The people are dying out here. We are being crushed by inflation (my definition of inflation is an inflated money supply created by the FED that makes the dollars in your pocket worth less than they did before the extra currency was dumped into the market). People are losing homes, we have money that is virtually worthless. Even people with upper echelon jobs are being crushed. Attorneys are getting standard 3% raises when the real cost of inflation is around 13%. Doctors are getting out of schools owing so much money they will be stuck paying off the loans until they are 50 or more.
The country needed Ron Paul to have any chance to get on a track that will save them. Now they are stuck with three socialist war mongerers that will continue to bankrupt the country and destroy what little is left of the middle class.
It was the people that rose up and deserve the credit for the money bombs. The people that decided that raising money for this cause was more important than keeping their musical instruments, or their CD collections, or their college fund. The people decided that the only chance of hope, no matter how slim was worth the gamble of giving much more than they could afford. The people were reaching out for that glimmer of hope. That is why this little “trick” of raising money will not work with other candidates. That is why this “trick” was not “created” by any one person.
Most importantly, by taking credit for creating the “money bomb” the author diminishes the reason it was successful, and dilutes the meaning and the impact of the message. I would expect that from the MSM, a statist entity that has no idea what it is like to desire non-statism, but for a Ron Paul supporter and freedom seeker to do so, well, that is just plain sad.
That is why I am so disappointed. Apparently, some of us were in this to save our lives and freedoms and to give our country a chance for a future and others, well, they just wanted some accolades.
June 18th, 2008 at 1:49 pm (#)
Page Davis…
Man i just love your blog, keep the cool posts comin…..
June 19th, 2008 at 2:27 am (#)
Response to: jeffiner44
It sounds to me like you feel that you never got the credit you deserved? There were 38,000 patriots that donated that day and everyone of them was a hero. The reason I posted that article was because I was promoting 50 for flag day. I thought it would be cool to share my story. Hell I passed up a lot of media interviews like Alex Jones so forgive me for typing on a blog.
I am glad you are a part of the movement but if you think trying to tear me down makes you a better person it’s quite the contrary. This is a baseless slander why don’t you figure out what side of the movement your on?
In my article I explained it was an awesome grassroots from so many people. It was and is the evolution to our revolution, I get that. As Ron Paul says there is to many people to thank it’s the damn truth. I happen to be the lucky guy to think of the day and act on it and make a video. Is that an outrageous thing to say is that a false statement? It was 3 weeks until the day and We the People came together and made it happen. I have no shame…
My Thanks go to the OP Mr. Gallagher nice surprise to see this posted.
Best,
James