Attention! You who wish to make your discontent known to the ruling faction,
an organizing consulta is to take place in Iowa City, IA for the 2008
Republican National Convention in St. Paul, MN. This will be a planning
meeting for those in Iowa (although not exclusive to those in Iowa) wishing
to be a part of a broader struggle against the existent order.

Come to flesh out ideas, find out about other groups organizing around the
country for the RNC/DNC, and get in on the start of intensive planning to
shake up and shut down the Conventions!

As part of the build-up to the Conventions in 2008, Des Moines , IA will be
holding a Caucus of the Future! And we will be discussing and planning for
this event, which is to run concurrently with the Iowa Caucuses and will be
comprised of workshops/skillshares, discussions and performances that will
help us practice ways we can take the power out of the hands of those who
claim to represent our interests, be they elected or unelected, and
redistribute it into healthy, sustainable communities. For more information
on the “counter-caucus” or if you wish to get involved visit
www.caucusofthefuture.com, and come to our consulta of course!

Some points of unity identified by the Twin Cities’ organizers RNC Welcoming
Committee which we feel are important to lay out as a starting point:

1. A rejection of Capitalism, Imperialism, and the State;

2. Resist the commodification of our shared and living Earth;

3. Organize on the principles of decentralization, autonomy, sustainability,
and mutual aid;

4. Work to end all relationships of domination and subjugation, including
but not limited to those rooted in patriarchy, race, class, and homophobia;

5. Oppose the police and prison-industrial complex, and maintain solidarity
with all targets of state repression;

6. Directly confront systems of oppression, and respect the need for a
diversity of tactics.

This Iowa Consulta shall take place on Sat. Dec. 1, 2007 , 5pm in meeting
room D of the Iowa City Public Library, 123 S Linn St, Iowa City , IA 52240.

Please RSVP as soon as you can so we can take care of anyone with need of
directions, questions, suggestions, or in need of place to stay or
childcare. email: velocipedeinfoshop@riseup.net or fellowworker@yahoo.com

Read more about radical organizing against the Conventions here
http://www.rncwelcomingcommittee.org/, here http://www.recreate68.org/ here
http://www.unconventionalaction.org/ and here
http://mkeanarchy.bravehost.com/

(The following is from an Unconvential Action statement on RNC/DNC
organizing.)

Why Protest the Conventions?

The Democratic and Republican National Conventions present a tremendous
opportunity for anarchists and other opponents of war and oppression. If the
increasingly unpopular occupation of Iraq is still in effect by summer of
2008, it will be obvious that neither docile street marches nor electoral
campaigns are effective means of opposing it; it will likewise be clear that
the Democratic opposition is either not capable of or not interested in
following through on their promises of ending the war, let alone solving all
the additional problems capitalism poses.

Tens of thousands have participated in protests at the conventions preceding
the past two elections; we can expect the 2008 conventions to be a major
flashpoint. If we successfully disrupt them, this will inaugurate a new era
of oppositional activity — and just in time, as federal repression
intensifies, wars breed new generations of terrorists, and global warming
worsens the ecological crisis.

Why Organize in Advance?

We must go into these protests with a strategy that is widely known,
instantly comprehensible, and integrates a diversity of tactics and
approaches. The farther in advance this strategy is established, and the
broader the diversity of groups that utilize it, the more effective we can
expect to be.

One of the fundamental shortcomings of the demonstrations at the Republican
National Convention in 2004 was that there was no generalized strategy for
anarchists, anti-authoritarians, and anti-capitalists. As a result, though
tens of thousands came to the city, many had a difficult time coordinating
their efforts or even figuring out what to do besides join marches organized
by hierarchical groups. Establishing a strategy early on gives us the
advantage of taking the initiative to determine what we do together.

A good strategy provides a simple goal that all the specific actions of
individual protesters can combine to achieve. The strategy of the Direct
Action Network at the Seattle WTO protests in 1999 was a good example of
this: by announcing early that their intention was to block off and shut
down the summit, DAN gave all the participants in the protests a common end
to strive for.

Everyone need not fall in line behind a single strategy, but there must be
an easy way for people to plug into and contribute to something larger than
themselves. Even explicitly autonomous actions are more effective in the
context of broadly coordinated activity. A strategy is not the same as a
unified plan of action; it is simply a framework within which different
plans and approaches can complement one another. A good strategy works
whether or not the authorities are aware of it: it enables individual groups
to retain their privacy in planning how to play their part, and takes into
account the responses that can be expected from the police. The past years
of experience have shown that not having a plan ourselves, simply so the
police will not catch wind of our plan, is not effective.

The strategies for these demonstrations will have to take into account the
local context of the host cities and the current political situation. It
will also be useful to draw on the lessons of more recent mass actions such
as the previous RNC in New York, the G8 summits in Scotland and Germany, and
the anti-war protests of 2003.

Finally, it is important that we do not approach these protests in a vacuum.
We can only expect to arrive at the conventions ready to act effectively if
there are actions leading up to them at which we can gain experience and
momentum. Likewise, we would do well to aim beyond the protests, using them
above all as an opportunity to build up national networks capable of
powerful, horizontal, decentralized organizing for a long time to come.