CWB supporters

[just_wondering]

CWB Supporters,

On January 22, 2007, this proposal was forwarded to you proposing a meeting on February 10, 2007. Because of the high activity of people on the barley vote, it was decided to postpone this meeting to February 24, 2007, with the place being chosen.

Date: February 24, 2007
Location: Regina, SK, Travelodge Inn, S. Albert.
Time: 8:30 - Registration
9:30 - Call to Order
5:00 - Wrap Up

A central location in the prairies still requires that many travel long distances. We believe that organizing to work together to save the CWB will be well worth it.

We recognize that some activities in the plan are currently under way. Our objective is to augment and support these current actives and get more involved in them as well.

As well as organizing this meeting we now have a website up dedicated to this issue. Currently, it has pertinent documents on the benefits of the CWB to the prairie farmer and more has to be added. This is for having easy access to the best information for our work. The next feature to be added will be the 'current activities' to save our CWB.

The URL for the site is http://www.savemycwb.ca

Please review and make suggestions about the site and articles which you think need to be added. All of this work (like our work to save the CWB) is voluntary and current information will have priority.

Please feel free to forward or fax this meeting information to other interested supporters. We hope that you are able to attend to contribute in finalizing this action plan.

Please email or call if you are planning to attend.

Hope to see you there,

Paul Harmon Ken Sigurdson
(306)299-4555 (204)734-3644

[just_wondering]

an attachemnt to above
this is the best they have

Meeting the emergency: building CWB support at the grassroots NOW!
- - a proposal - -

“What will farmers have left to defend if the Board is destroyed?”
Herb Schulz
“This is the hill to die on.”
Wendy Holm
1. The current situation:

The CWB plebiscite in Manitoba clearly supported the single-desk, but the big story is Strahl’s masterstroke in appointing Greg Arason over the heads of the elected board despite failure to dislodge the pro-CWB majority in recent elections. Speculation is rampant over how Strahl and the new Board will proceed with much energy absorbed in palace intrigue. Former CEO Measner has been the Board’s most effective champion to date but he’s been fired, and Chair Ken Ritter, saying he’s sick and wants peace with Strahl, is clearly not the best board member to be leading the fight. The December 13th demonstration in Winnipeg was extremely encouraging but to date no groundswell has emerged from the countryside in popular support of the Board.

2. What do we need to do?

· provide and develop leadership to make CWB stronger
· reinvigorate the elected directors by building a popular grassroots support
· regain the initiative Strahl seized through his appointment of Arason and anti-CWB board members
· re-energize permit book holders by developing a effective campaign
· more effective popular communications and information

3. How do we do it?

· it is time for political action – to show Harper and Strahl the high electoral cost of continuing their vendetta against the CWB
· start organizing an effective popular opposition to stop it
· we need single issue, non-partisan campaign to save the CWB
· talk to the government through demonstrations and lobbying
· we have to begin mobilizing grain producers in the countryside
· get the supply managed sectors involved
· get other groups involved – SFL, MFL, cooperatives, the Co-operators Insurance, COC, CCPA, GSU, CAW, Friends of CBC, etc.
· threaten rural seats in Ontario, Quebec and prairies

4. Campaign issues which must be addressed:

· economic impact on producers
· who will gain total control of the grain handling infrastructure
· fate of producer cars: 3,000 producers- 10,000 cars per year
· fate of Port of Churchill, inland terminals, east/west rail links
· crippling of smaller players in the grain industry – Paterson, Mission Terminal, independent terminals
· echoes of the Crow: revisit losses to farmers; same players, same promises? review tactics in 1980s and ‘90s loss
· role played in transportation and international trade negotiations and challenges
· who is next- CGC, supply management, etc.
· GMO pollution of prairie system from USA
· truth about WCWGA and other opponents: tiny membership, narrow agenda, past sins, corporate sponsors
· truth about those who are working for the destructive policies and those appointed by Strahl: Glen Cummings, Howard Migie, Arason’s ties to the private grain trade, Mulroney and ADM, etc.

5. Campaign individuals:

· identify activist leaders – 50 committed people or more
· Larry Bodanovich
· Doug Chorney
· Bob Douglas
· Butch Harder
· Art Macklin
· Lawrence Nicholson
· Bob Roehle
· Bill Spafford
· December 15th demo organizers, donors and participants
· some or all pro-board CWB directors

6. Outline of proposed campaign:

Public meeting/summit of interested groups and individuals: The purpose of this meeting will be to regroup the troops, agree on a programme of action, and elect an Action Council to oversee implementation. The NFU and Real Voice should be invited as well as interested and Wild Rose members and other groups (producer car shippers, West Central Road and Rail, etc,) already in support. Develop links with supply management and UPA. CFA President Bob Freisen, a turkey producer and former Liberal candidate, should be asked to speak. News coverage would good but main goal would be to have a productive meeting and get the campaign effectively under way. Each group should agree to fund its own contributions but participants must establish a realistic overall budget and come prepared to commit necessary funds.

Up-to-the-minute pro-CWB information website: This would be an active information clearing house to post pro-Board articles and activities (from all sources including the non-farm press) and generate new material directed to permit holders themselves ("The truth about Chuck Strahl and Greg Arason – what is the agreement, "Who gave Greg Arason his $6,000 per month raise and who pays", etc.). Writers whose work would be sought out include Ken Larsen, Paul Beingessner, Bill Descavitch, Allan Dawson, Barry Wilson, Darren Qualman and Wendy Holm. Proprietary material could used with permission as is done on rabble.ca. A daily digest of CWB-pertinent stories derived from various outlets is essential to keep the site newsy and current. The currently dormant Real Voice website would great for this if they’d agree.

Pro-CWB speaker tours in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta: It’s essential the campaign be taken to the countryside. Speakers should be chosen, halls booked, and tours arranged in each province – a possible 4 in Manitoba, 6 in Alberta and 10 in Saskatchewan? Each event should include a rally at a MPs office and a meeting with speakers. Meetings must be properly advertised and promoted. Multiple speakers would be best wherever possible. Meetings can be timed tactically around other events (a barley vote for example) but must move quickly in a coordinated fashion to build momentum.

· make available CWB farm signs, bumper stickers, hats, petitions, letters, cards
· organizing speakers will encourage more activities; information speakers will provide history and future analysis.

High profile pro-CWB actions and activities in each province: These actions should take place following the speaking tour and include:

· meetings with the Premiers and Ministers of Agriculture in Manitoba and Saskatchewan to get them involved in fighting and funding activities to save the CWB and fund legal challenges if necessary
· demonstrations at all Tory MP’s offices, especially in vulnerable ridings;
· meetings with provincial Federations of Labour in all three provinces (starting with Saskatchewan);
· continue the NFU letter writing programme already under way

Speaking /meeting tour of southern Ontario and Quebec: Tour must include a few speaking engagements to interested farm groups, especially in Tory ridings in western Ontario’s grain belt and dairying strongholds in Quebec. Meetings must include supply management groups in each province and in Ottawa, as well as the UPA (the most powerful provincial farm organization in the country; President Laurent Pellerin is already on side). Other stops should include Parliament Hill and the Canadian Labour Congress in Ottawa and, if possible, a meeting with Buzz Hargrove in Toronto.

Prairie grain farmer mass delegation to Ottawa: If support warrants and timing allows the campaign should consider a mass delegation to Ottawa as the western Farm Unions organized in 1959 and the OFU in 1965. Good numbers would be essential but if a critical mass could be identified and assembled this would be a very effective tactic. The aims of the delegation would be to show massed strength, obtain effective national publicity, put Harper and Strahl on the defensive in their own backyard, and give opposition parties an opportunity promote the CWB and joint action in defence of the Board. Note: the OFU rented a ballroom at Chateau Laurier and invited the ag minister and others to come and defend their policies. It was enormously effective. A Save the Crow train went to Ottawa in about 1980.

7. Initial planning and schedule:

· preliminary review by Ken Sigurdson, Paul Harmon and Herb Schulz
· select circulation for further comment
· initiate planning as agreed

[just_wondering]

have a read and laugh this reads like winwin is writing yet they really believe. its all they have left.
The list of participants and issues reads like it's from the 80's. print it off and go just to see how the other side lives. They are so very afraid!
I was at the wheatgrower convention in calgary last week last speaker John Depapp was probably one of the best all convention if any-one has a chance to see him it would be worth the drive . I would like to see him against a few strong monopoly supporters in a debate.
well its time for bed I'll try and check in over the next few days. a good laugh before bed.

[silverback]

How much money would it take to do all of that outline?

Where exactly is it coming from?

[wd9]

Didn't Bill Spafford retire? Has he gone farming, or just nothing better to do?

[Fransisco]

Okay prediction time folks. Will this

A fizzle.

or

B go splat!

[Fransisco]

Let me help a bit here. See the problem here is these guys are just thinking to small.

Wendy Holmes needs to bring in the second coming of Castro to speak directly to Harper on the issue. 'Ol Butch Harder may be one of the party faithful but he's no Uncle Fidel.

LOL

[parsley]

just_wondering,

I got to laughing at your winwin quote in the other thread:

"100million human beings lost their lives in the last century in order to perfect forced collectivisation.Since that is the kind of thinking that the cwb monopoly is based on,we owe it to those people to keep the cwb monopoly going here,in the designated area/utopia."

Doesn't that sound like the theme for the Bob Roehle/Wendy Holm battlecry calling the faithful to join, and singing Coom-by-ah?

Hey just_wondering and fransisco and Wd9, wanna go to a meeting in Regina?

wd9 does the booking?

Fight fire with fire! silverback, your thoughts are always well-organized, could you bring 10 women who'll "Burn their Anti-Buzz bras, or better yet, 10 men.

Parsley

[wd9]

Big surprise, but I have another meeting to go to, but man, if it was 5 hours closer... You couldn't buy that kind of entertainment. Pretend to be from the media, you know, do a couple interviews, blend in. Wow.

I have to admit, it is amazing to watch this whole thing play out. Just imagine if all this energy was channeled to transportation! See Butch Harder, Bill Pafford, Larry, Doug, Bob, Lawrence etc pushing a loaded car of wheat down the track because the railways won't haul it, that is a news clip, hey! And my Asian, European and US colleagues say we Canadians are so lethargic when it comes to ag issues. Is this the begginning of the new generation in moving ag policy forward? Or backward I guess depending which side wins in the end.

Final Jeopardy question the other day, this 25 country organization spends half of its trade budget on ag trade policy? (and it's a big budget)

Do de do do, do de do, doo, deeee, doo doo doo doo doooooo, bomp bomp.

Sorry, in a wierd mood, thinking about a speech I have to write on the future. BTW you all are great to read, are always thought provoking, sometimes downright scary, but I appreciate the conversations on this website. Thankyou to all who write in.

[just_wondering]

this was the big quote that I took from this release, and then have echo in your head how many times
"this is an issue for farmers to decide"
there are so many acronyms here I don't know where they all belong COC???, CCPA??? for anyone else the auto workers are CAW grain services union are GSU I don't know how they could tie in freinds of the CBC more to follow
-get the supply managed sectors involved
· get other groups involved – SFL, MFL, cooperatives, the Co-operators Insurance, COC, CCPA, GSU, CAW, Friends of CBC, etc.
· threaten rural seats in Ontario, Quebec

[parsley]

wd9
You must be taking singing Do de do do lessons...on the other thread you were making up new words to a song and on thie one you're doing your scales. Ever try singing along with the old "Farmers' Union Songbook Collections of Collectivsm " I think you can get a copy from winwin!

If you happen to change your mind about the Regina meeting, give a shout to the old coot on this website with the satin boxes...he can dress you up.

just_wondering I think Buzz must have a permit book, otherwise he wouldn't be interested in all that grain going through the ports.


Parsley

[wd9]

JW, funny how they want farmers to decide, there was no plebescite, they asked for a plebiscite, plebiscite arrived, then they were upset it actually had the questions on it. Wierd.

BTW the answer is the EU. Yup, half their money for trade negotiations goes for ag. Can't blame them, they know what it is like to starve. Hope Canada never has to learn that lesson.