Thing One: When and if live-streams of the convention sessions (beginning at 9am Pacific) show up on the Libertarian Party's YouTube channel, I'll attempt to embed them here (just embedding the channel is harder than it sounds and won't necessarily feature current live-streams, so I'll have to try to keep up manually).
Thing Two: A few resources. Here's the Libertarian Party's YouTube Channel. Here's the convention schedule/agenda. Here's a dedicated thread at Independent Political Report where you'll find other people's reportage/perspectives. Here's a PDF of the purported "Strategic Action Plan" from the Mises PAC, a Republican "infiltrate and neuter" operation attempting to take over the party at the national level to protect the GOP.
Thing Three: Live updates, in reverse chronological order, below whenever I notice something happening that I think is worth passing on. Yes, I love you guys so much that I'm giving up the opportunity to inflate my post count in favor of putting it all in one place (or at least most of it -- SOME things may merit their own posts as well).
Thing Four: By all means, feel free to offer your own opinions on events (and any news updates you might get scoop on) in comments.
LIVE UPDATES BELOW
5:02pm -- Adjourned for the day. Note: McArdle's performance improved once she stopped staring at a sheet of paper and mumbling. And debate performances aside, she probably has this in the bag. The thing about Republican "infiltrate and neuter" operations is that they have the money to get their operatives to the convention, and we're a small enough party that it's not that hard to overpower us.
4:30pm -- Dasbach speaks. McArdle reads from a sheet of paper. About having better communication skills.
4:23pm -- Motion to suspend the rules to move the chair debate to 7pm, proceed with Spike Cohen's speech, etc. Motion isn't seconded. Orders of the day are called to get on with the damn debate. Objection, someone has a motion. Shouted down. Jim Turney moderates chair debate, starting now.
4:20pm -- Motion to suspend the rules to adjourn immediately after chair debate instead of during the middle of it. Passes.
4:16pm -- Something something recess, something regional caucuses, point of information, point of parliamentary inquiry, yada yada yada.
3:52pm -- Chair debate to commence, eventually. Included candidates are former chair Steve Dasbach and Mises PAC candidate Angela McArdle. But maybe others, because there's action on the floor.
3:38pm -- Credentials report while awaiting token count.
3:29pm -- Took a nap during the speech. Woke up to Harlos chewing people out for something and someone yelling about rainbow shirts and tokens for the debate for chair being counted. Motion to suspend rules to open nominations for chair. Fails.
2:55pm -- Finally, maybe, getting to keynote speech. Maybe. Yes. So 30 minutes until business resumes. See you then. Maybe.
2:47pm -- Argument over how to count votes in divisions.
2:43pm -- Mises PAC's alternative agenda wins. Moving to keynote address by Justin Amash.
2:23pm -- Vote on alternative agenda. Chair says motion fails. Harlos calls for division.
2:09pm -- More haggling over credentials (number of delegates and alternates eligible to vote, etc.).
1:43pm -- Gavel back to order. Some kind of medical situation on the floor.
1:26pm -- In an attempt to liven this thing up a little bit, I had lunch. And for dessert, a dried-up, desiccated mushroom cap and stem of a particular kind (IYKWIMAITYD) that I found abandoned in an old drawer. As Hunter S. Thompson noted, when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro. So hopefully the going is about to get weird.
12:12pm -- Recess for lunch (90 minutes) while alternative agenda is printed, etc. for vote to suspend the rules and hand the party over to Michael Heise.
11:59am -- Harlos moves to suspend the rules to adopt alternative agenda (the Mises PAC's agenda for the destruction of the party).
11:55am -- Motion to adopt the agenda (yes, after three hours, that's where we are at).
11:52am -- Mises PAC fails to remove Whitney Bilyeu as chair. Resolution to call Josh Smith the dishonest anti-LP grifter he is rejected as out of order.
11:27am -- Vote on the motion to replace the chair. Counted vote coming up.
11:18am -- Motion to replace the chair, and replace her with Ken Moellman, who has just announced that he's not interested in the job.
11:17am -- Question called after Harlos's attempt to bulldoze the chair fails. Fails. Credentials report ACCEPTED WITHOUT OBJECTION. WOW!
11am -- Motion to strike Massachusetts delegation (Mises PAC impostor organization) from report and replace it with the other delegation (actual Massachusetts LP plus impostor faction). Harlos attempts parliamentary witchcraft, appeals ruling of the chair, Starr attempts to take over the mics as usual. But makes a sound point.
10:55am -- Delegates vote to NOT hear the minority credentials report. Moving toward vote on accepting credentials report. Move by "Gravy King," aka Matt Hicks, to amend the report to strike the Pennsylvania delegation report as having been selected in violation of state laws and Pennsylvania LP bylaws. Question called. Motion fails.
10:22am -- Still a bunch of procedural stuff going on, delegates are at ease during delegation polling, etc. The credentials report has NOT been voted on yet. Per the agenda, that should be done by 10:35 am. I wouldn't bet the ranch on that.
9:45am -- If the live stream is buffering for you, it's not just you. It's everyone. It went south during the discussion of delegate numbers. I suspect that Aaron Starr may have gained control of all microphones simultaneously and overloaded the available streaming bandwidth. While we're down, I'm going to think about whether it's "live stream," "live-stream," or "livestream," because I've been using all of them.
9:33am -- Objection to hearing credentials committee minority report by Caryn Ann Harlos, who is already attempting to assume the position of Parliamentary Fuckery Alpha.
9:28am -- Credentials committee report begins after parliamentary fuckery apparently dies.
9:25am -- Called to order, immediate point of order concerning the use of "voting cards." Turns out they are not "voting cards" but "delegate management cards." Ruling of the chair appealed. Immediate parliamentary fuckery, lots of yelling, etc. Yes, shocking, I know.
9:04am -- Chair informing the delegates that people need to clear the aisles for floor mics to be put out before things can get going. Live feed is up above, but it seems to be audio only, no video.
8:55am -- Things should be kicking off very shortly. BTW, I will also do some select re-tweeting of things from the convention here.
6:15am -- Found a Facebook thread on the LNC meeting mentioned previously. Nothing of great interest seems to have happened there. Which explains why my more reliable sources didn't mention anything of interest happening there. So I expect any real news won't come until the first full convention business session kicks off in 3 hours and 45 minutes.
5:20am -- The rumors of actual (instead of merely predicted) skulduggery are already spreading. Per the LNC's email discussion list, a Libertarian National Committee meeting was scheduled for yesterday at 2:30pm. There's video of "Libertarian National Convention" from that time frame listed on the party's channel, but that video has been removed. What happened? I don't know. One (only semi-reliable) Facebook commenter posited that the entryist PAC may have pulled some kind of coup. I haven't heard back from the more reliable sources I've queried on the matter.
4:58am -- Setting up the placeholder post, mainly so that I can cue myself to stick to Pacific Time rather than Eastern Time (I'm blogging from the latter time zone).
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