The goal of the unofficial commission was to put the following
ballot question before San Francisco voters in the 2008
general election: The group was
chaired by Brian McConnell, a self-described "inventor, author and entrepreneur" with experience organizing events in
San Francisco's LGBT community. McConnell, who adopted the
alias T. Wayne Pickering during the campaign and often dressed as
Uncle Sam while soliciting signatures, allegedly conceived of the idea while discussing the
Bush presidency at a bar. Other early co-sponsors included
performing artist and former "experimental" mayoral candidate
"Chicken" John Rinaldi. Going into April 2008, the
grassroots movement had a working website and six total members. By month's end, an
SFist article about the group had received brief mentions from larger publications including
The Washington Post and
The Huffington Post, and membership had increased to more than 600. In May, the commission set up a
Twitter account that provided followers with advance notice of its canvassing activities, which depended entirely on
volunteers and primarily targeted local events and bars. The San Francisco Department of Elections required a minimum of valid voter
signatures by July 7 in order for the measure to be included in the November election. prompting a
New York Times story which appeared the next morning and led
WorldNetDaily correspondent Lester Kinsolving to ask
White House Press Secretary Dana Perino for an official reaction at a
press briefing hours later. A wave of national and even international press coverage followed, with prominent outlets including
The Associated Press, the
BBC and
Die Zeit producing print and broadcast content about the petition both before and after its official approval for the ballot. On July 7, the day of the ballot initiative submission
deadline, the commission launched a
WordPress blog, announcing with its first post that they had turned in 11,999 signatures. According to their own figures "every zip code in San Francisco [was] represented," with nearly half of all signatories coming from the
Mission,
Castro or
Haight-Ashbury neighborhoods. Ten days later, the measure was officially qualified for the November election, one of three propositions to earn a spot on the San Francisco ballot through
the initiative process that year. After being assigned the name Proposition R on August 14, the commission produced several "Yes on R"
campaign materials, including
flyers and a
video featuring the
slogan "R is for Remember" and original artwork by San Francisco-based
visual artist pixelstud. The group also announced plans for an
election night press conference featuring
drag performer
Peaches Christ, whom they identified as a
spokesperson. ==Opposition==