Representatives and members of the RI Tea Party, The Republican Party, the Progressive Democrats of Rhode Island, The Green Party, Direct Action for Rights and Equality, Occupy Providence, The Rhode Island Sierra Club, RI Taxpayers, The Rhode Island Libertarian Party, and the Capital Good Fund stood side by side to take a stand against corporate welfare.

This event was put together by Coalition Radio’s Pat Ford and David Fisher, with help from Lauren Niedel of the Progressive Democrats. Ford acted as emcee for the event, in which 13 speakers and one poet spoke to a crowd of about 80 people. Inside the RICC offices, more than 100 more people attended the meeting where Skeffington and other PawSox owners revealed that they were amenable to negotiating a better deal.

Gina Raimondo essentially rejected the first deal offered, which would have, in the words of more than one speaker, “socialized the risk and privatized the profits” of the new venture.

Pat Ford spoke first, saying that “it is not the role of government to subsidize risk for private enterprise.”

Lauren Niedel of the Rhode Island Progressive Democrats put the deal into stark economic relief: As Rhode Island prepares to carve $90 million out of Medicaid, how can we justify giving away millions of dollars to millionaires?

Andrew Posner, executive director of the Capital Good Fund, said that “every day I look at families that are hungry, that are poor, that don’t have jobs… that’s what we should be spending our time and money talking about.”

The Tea Party’s Mike Puyana said that the deal is “something called crony corporatism, it’s as far from equality under the law as it’s possible to get.”

“I don’t think I ever imagined that i was going to be at a rally with the Tea Party on the same side,” said Fred Ordonez of DARE, “but here we are!”

On a more serious note, Ordonez said, “Every time we see a huge development get all kinds of tax breaks and tax subsidies, the poor communities in providence get poorer and poorer.”

Larry Girouard, of Rhode island Taxpayers, said that a new stadium downtown is the last thing we need to spur economic growth. “The issue is taxes, regulation, infrastructure. This is just a diversion from the real problems.

The Green Party, represented by Greg Gerritt, brought up some of the environmental concerns, such as the risks of moving the new sewer line. “When you do things like that, you can do it right, but often it introduces more leaks into a system.”

“The state of Rhode Island has no business taking money out of the hands of taxpayers and giving it to millionaires,” said Gina Catalano of the Rhode Island Republican Party, “to be expected to make that investment with zero return, is ludicrous.”

Representing the Sierra Club, Asher Schofield, owner of the small business Frog and Toad, hit the crowd with a baseball metaphor, and tried to inspire us all towards something better.

“Providence is not a minor league city. We are what we dream ourselves to be. What we want to be. And we want to be major league. These are antiquated notions, the idea of public financing of private enterprise. This [deal] is not the grand notion that we need to have as a city moving forward… These minor league aspirations are beneath us.”

This deal, says Rhode Island Libertarian Party leader Mike Rollins, “is the exact opposite of everything we stand for.”

Occupy Providence’s Randall Rose made excellent points, and even read from a textbook about how bad it is for cities to invest money in minor league baseball teams. Rose read from the book Minor League Baseball and Local Economic Development, noting that, “there have been books on this, the scam is run so often.”

“The economic impact of a minor league team,” read Rose, “is not sufficient to justify the relatively large public expenditure for a minor league stadium.”

Steve Frias of the Republican Party, noted that the assembled crowd was comprised of people with “different viewpoints, but we all agree that this is a stupid deal.”

Roland Gauvin, an independent political activist, promised politicians who support such efforts that “a vote for this is the last time [politicians] will ever be voting, because we will vote them out of office.” Gauvin had especially choice words for Speaker of the House Nicholas Mattiello, saying, “And I will be willing to go to any district in Rhode island, starting in Mattiello’s district, and work my way down.”

Finally, before the crowd moved inside to join the RICC meeting already in progress, Cathy Orloff lead the crowd in a participatory poem against the stadium, with five baseball references built in.

I’m not buying it. First, Democrats are extremely well-equipped, monetarily, to fend off challengers (for instance, Speaker Fox alone has a quarter of a million dollars, search the filings here). Second, I’d be more inclined to believe that the RI GOP was a strong and credible organization if they actually came off that way. But go to their website and tool around for a bit. I found these problems with it:

• The carousel only has one thing on it, leading to lots of clicking on those arrows.
• The sole item in the carousel asks if you’ve heard their radio ad, but clicking on it just brings you back to the home page.
• The “At The Front” blog has one article, which discusses Rhode Island Democrats and hardly mentions the Republicans.
• There are no events on the events page.
• The lead story in “Latest News” is the selection of Delegates for the Convention.
• There’s a Twitter feed, but it’s used so rarely (tweets from 13 and 28 days ago) that it might as well be static.
• RIGOPtv (their YouTube channel) shows a video from 2011 about the jobs plan put out by the U.S. House Republicans.
• The “About” section is about Mr. Zaccaria, not the party.

Obviously, the Democrats have a much better website (they also have more money to spend on it). And obviously, you can have a crappy website and still be a really great organization. But in the 21st Century, we should note that websites are often the first impression you make on people. And RIGOP.org is not an inspiring impression, though its big candidates (Brendan Doherty & Barry Hinckley) have much stronger websites.

My main issue is with any political organization (Republican, Tea Party, Democrat, Progressive, Green, Moderate, etc.) looking to undo the establishment is that “less is more” does not seem to be an actual functioning approach. There’s just so many things you get from more candidates:

• A Sense of Movement: When you have a lot of people standing up and declaring themselves under your banner it makes people take notice. It also means that you have more chances to win. If you can’t assist everyone with your meager resource, then focus on those you believe have a chance, and make it clear to those you can’t that you’ll help them if you gain those resources.
• Larger Networks: Each candidate brings in a different social network. The more candidates that are running, the greater amplification of your organization’s message through their networks. Also, the people they attract to their campaigns are going to be your next generation of candidates and supporters. With fewer candidates, you’re restricting yourself.
• Drowns Out the Wackos: Some people just have weird beliefs. And they’re often dedicated enough to act upon those beliefs. More candidates means that you’ll keep those folks from totally defining your organization. Obviously, if you’re not a political party, you can exert more control over your candidates. But since the only way to keep someone from running under your banner as a party is to primary them, more candidates means you can show such candidates to by atypical.
• Free Experience: Training people requires work and time. While it behooves you to offer training to candidates and their staff, there’s nothing like real, on-the-job experience. Yes, inexperienced people screw up. But that’s how people learn. Your goal as a political organization should be to minimize and counteract those mistakes, making it easier for people to participate without sinking your candidates.

Those are benefits I see. Certainly, I’m no heroic field director or party organizer. I think for the Republicans to announce that they’re fielding almost half of the candidates they had in the last election makes it look like they’re contracting, rather then expanding. Which makes them look far weaker then might actually be the case. And if the emphasis is going to be on quality rather than quantity, you have to be of better quality then your opponents.

The other issue here is that perhaps the Republicans have set their sights too low. Forcing a floor debate on major bills isn’t exactly the rallying cry that inspired Tea Party activists last election cycle (“We Want Our Country Back!”). If someone promised me they were going to lose a lot while talking a lot, I’d laugh in their face. The promise needs to be big: our members are going to have control of the state. That should be the promise of any party or organized faction in the state. Republicans aren’t even promising to take one chamber of the General Assembly.

Because but no matter your goal, you’re probably not going to live up to it (unless you’re the ruling Democratic Party). And if you’re going to go down, go down kicking and screaming, because whimpering doesn’t look strong.