Marrero, K

<p>=</p><p>not wacko http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/18/usa-politics-tennessee-idUSL1E8SB7YV20120518
</p><p>
</p><dl id="overview"><dd class="summary-current" style="display:block">

Owner

Blue Collar Muse Media

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</dd><dt id="overview-summary-education-title" class="summary-education" style="display:block">

Education

</dt><dd class="summary-education" style="display:block">

Leadership Institute

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Fuller Theological Seminary - Pasadena, CA

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Sterling College - Sterling, KS

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</dd></dl><p>bs:

started blogging at BlueCollarMuse.com in late 2006. In early 2007, I

clicked on a text ad - "Free Conservative Blog Hosting" - and met Eric

Odom. That friendship changed my life.

I began public speaking as a presenter at the Conservative Leadership

Conference 2007 in Reno, NV. Returning to Nashville after CLC, I founded

the Tennessee ConserVOLiance to bring TN's Center-Right online

activists together. It remains one of the nation's most successful state

based online alliances.

I spent 2008 at the Sam Adams Alliance traveling nationally to organize

online state groups similar to the ConserVOLiance. During the 2008

August Recess I worked with Eric Odom with the #DontGo Movement as a

volunteer.

Leaving SAA in 2009, I worked with Eric Odom at

OfficialChicagoTeaParty.com and TaxDayTeaParty.com - the sites that

birthed the current Tea Party Movement. I have been privileged to speak

at and participate at many Tea Parties in Middle Tennessee since then.

In late 2009, Eric and I started the American Liberty Alliance. The high

point of that organization was the 6 week RV tour of the US, The

American Liberty Tour. After the Tour, I returned to TN I returned to

blogging and the ConserVOLiance where I still practice my activism.

In early 2011 I was elected to the my local county GOP Executive

Committee to help organize grassroots ahead of the 2012 elections.

It is my purpose to engage the general public and effectively educate

them on matters of principle and policy; to restore the nation's vision

of Limited Government, Low Taxes and Individual Liberty, and; to find

others with the same call and work to promote their efforts - working

together to accomplish more together than we can separately.

</p><div id="profile-specialties" style="display:block">

<h4>Specialties</h4>

<p class="null">Local, State and National Alliance building, Community

Organizing, Blogging, Public Speaking and New Media Promotion and

Mentoring</p>

</div>

<h2>Ken Marrero's Experience

</h2>

</div>

<div>

<span class="title">Owner</span>

</h3>

<span class="org summary">Blue Collar Muse Media</span>

</strong>

</h4>

</div>

<abbr class="dtstart" title="2006-10-01">October 2006</abbr>

�� <abbr class="dtstamp" title="2013-04-05">Present</abbr>

<span class="duration"><span class="value-title" title="P6Y7M"> </span>(6 years 7 months)</span>

Blue Collar Muse started as my pen name at my blog of the same name. It

was there that I developed my skills and the relationships that would

later grow BCM to what it has become.

From "just a blogger" on politics, national and international events and

policy of the Center/Right persuasion, I've branched out to become a

podcaster and public/conference speaker and behind the scenes advocate

in the fields of eActivism, eOrganization, eTraining and development.

Thus Blue Collar Muse has today become more of an umbrella covering my

work and association with such groups as Conservablogs.com, RedState,

The New Media Alliance, The Tennessee ConserVOLiance and more.

</p>

</div>

</div><p>===</p><p>Samuel Adams was the brewer and patriot who, in 1773, ginned up a mob of Bostonians dressed as Native Americans which conducted <a href="http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/teaparty.htm">history's original Tea Party</a>. The president of Sam Adams Alliance is <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/john-tsarpalas/4/ba/b24">John Tsarpalas</a>, former executive director of the Illinois State Republican party. Eric O'Keefe, SAA's <a href="http://action.samadamsalliance.org/popView.php?Table=Newsletters&Prefix=Newsletter&ID=35">chairman</a> and <a href="http://sunshinereview.org/index.php/Eric_O%27Keefe">CEO</a>, is a former executive director of the National Libertarian Party. He once worked for Citizens for Congressional Reform (<a href="http://www.michiganlp.org/Past%20Newsletters/Michigan%20Libertarian%20Vol%2020%20%28BIB%201.1%29%201991%20May-%20June.pdf">pdf</a>),

a project of David Koch's Citizens for a Sound Economy. Along with

noted Libertarian financier Howard Rich, O'Keefe sits on the board of

directors of Americans for Limited Government.

Shortly before online activist Eric Odom helped kick-start the Tea

Party movement, he was new media director for Sam Adams Alliance. This

put him in charge of (among other things) setting up <a href="http://taxdayteaparty.com/2009/11/our-statement-about-tea-party-patriots/">websites</a>, coordinating <a href="http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=69428711302">Facebook groups</a>, <a href="http://twitter.com/libertyalliance">managing</a> <a href="http://twitter.com/taxdayteaparty">Twitter</a> <a href="http://twitter.com/blogivists">accounts</a> and other social networking tasks. Odom's first known acts as a Tea Partier were to set up the <a href="http://officialchicagoteaparty.com/">OfficialChicagoTeaParty.com</a> site and <a href="http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=152052919129">Facebook</a>

pages within hours of Rick Santelli's February rant, then spreading

word through Twitter, initially utilizing #TCOT, a Twitter list and

hashtag for <a href="http://www.kithbridge.com/tcot/index.php/about-the-list">Top Conservatives on Twitter</a>.

Both Odom and another former Sam Adams Alliance staffer,<font color="#FF0000"> Ken Marrero</font>,

are now leaders of American Liberty Alliance. Odom is executive

director and Marrero is director of grassroots outreach and coalitions.

Marrero was a regional new media specialist with Sam Adams Alliance. In <a href="http://hotair.com/archives/2008/07/31/the-ed-morrissey-show-sam-adams-alliance-eyeblast-porkbusters-project/">July 2008</a>

he described Sam Adams Alliance as "an outgrowth of, I think, visions

and dreams from some people who started at Americans for Limited

Government."

John Tillman served as president and director of Americans for

Limited Government during its start-up phase as well. According to the

Illinois Policy Institute, Tillman grew Americans for Limited Government

"from a single, part-time employee in May of 2004 to a staff of

approximately 25 that had a significant impact on political activity in

13 states in 2006."

Tillman is also president and CEO of the <a href="http://www.illinoispolicy.org/content/?section=456&section2=463&page=463">Illinois Policy Institute</a>.

Within hours of Rick Santelli's rant, Kristina Rasmussen, who had just

been hired as the Executive Vice President by the Illinois Policy

Institute that morning, helped kick start the Chicago Tea Party by

participating in a February 19 conference call to plan the event.

Rasmussen, who was then the Director of Government Affairs at National

Taxpayers Union, was the second speaker on the call. Tillman also serves

on Sam Adams Alliance's board of directors and was president and COO of

Sam Adams Alliance during its start up phase.

Odom formed American Liberty Alliance in March of this year through a combination of <a href="http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2009-12-05-images-BlogivistsMovingOn.jpg">the gift</a> of Sam Adams Alliance's <a href="http://blogivists.com/">blogivists.com</a>, a conservative blog hosting hub, and the #DontGo movement, founded by Odom in 2008 to support offshore drilling.

American Liberty Alliance is not the only Sam Adams Alliance

affiliate in this fight, however. American Majority, a self-described

"political training institute", is a "concept" of Sam Adams Alliance,

which in turn describes itself as AM's "sponsor". American Majority

staff includes former George W Bush speechwriter <a href="http://www.missourirecord.com/news/index.asp?article=10054">Ned Ryun</a>, regional field director for Bush/Cheney '04 <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/ppl/webprofile?vmi=&id=10478660&pvs=pp&authToken=BBCC&authType=name&locale=en_US&trk=ppro_viewmore&lnk=vw_pprofile">Lonny Leitner</a>, former Republican state legislator <a href="http://www2.ljworld.com/chats/2008/oct/09/shari_weber/">Shari Weber</a>, and former director of operations at the Oklahoma Republican Party, Matt Pinnell.

American Majority also got involved this summer on Sam Adams

Alliance's American Liberty Tour, offering organizer trainings prior to

each tour event. The Tour itself was billed as a project of American

Liberty Alliance, Sam Adams Alliance and Americans for Limited

Government.

Long before Sam Adams Alliance's recent <a href="http://www.samadamsalliance.org/">website redesign</a>, they altered an <a href="http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2009-12-06-images-samadamsalliancekochconnection.jpg">internship recruitment page</a>

that connected Sam Adams Alliance to Koch Industries: "Interested

parties can apply for a Sam Adams Alliance internship through the

Charles G. Koch Summer Fellow Program administered by the Institute for

Humane Studies and the State Policy Network." The internship is still

listed on the <a href="http://www.theihs.org/ContentDetails.aspx?id=645">IHS website</a>.

Charles Koch founded the IHS. The internship page existed up until the

site's ongoing redesign, but recently the Koch reference was absent from

the Sam Adams Alliance website. An <a href="http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/03/did_playboy_just_disappear_an.php">article</a>

in Playboy Magazine, taken down almost as soon as it was posted,

claimed the Koch reference was scrubbed on Feb. 16. Three days later,

Santelli's <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEZB4taSEoA&feature=player_embedded">supposedly-spontaneous</a> rant kick-started the Tea Party movement, enabled by Odom's on-line assistance.

<strong>Read full coverage detailing the various parts of the <a>Anatomy of the Tea Party Movement</a>:</strong></p>

<ul><li class="first"><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380567.html">Tea Party Patriots</a></li><li><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380575.html">FreedomWorks</a></li><li><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380592.html">Tea Party Express</a></li><li><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380608.html">Americans for Prosperity</a></li><li><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380626.html">American Liberty Alliance</a></li><li>Sam Adams Alliance</li><li><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380669.html">American Future Fund</a></li><li><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380687.html">RecessRally.com</a></li><li class="last"><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-brantzawadzki/anatomy-of-the-tea-party_b_380691.html">The Media</a></li></ul>