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Fri 29 Aug, 2003 07:13 pm
I got involved as a volunteer with the Howard Dean campaign only twenty two days ago.
What I initially thought was a mere flirtation, quickly became a committed relationship. Now, a little over three weeks after going to my first meet-up, I have been involved with nine events, I own Howard Dean tee shirts, buttons, bumper stickers and signs. I've donated a very substantial sum of money to the campaign, and I have buried my poor relatives and friends (including A2Kers) in a blizzard of Dean-related emails, links, newspaper articles etc....and my involvement continues to GROW!
Well, in a rare moment of compassion for my long suffering friends, I have decided to create this site as the principal depository of my Dean-related links, articles, activities, ponderings and ruminations.
It may or may not be useful or interesting to you all, (who, incidentally are cordially invited to share YOUR OWN thoughts etc. re Howard Dean and the Dean campaign) but one thing is certain --grouping them together this way will make them easier to AVOID!
--jjorge
Well done! I look forward to this.
I've been semi-active for... can't remember exactly... several months. A contributor and a flag waver at a couple of rallies. The latter is difficult for me: they are held in Austin and San Antonio, over an hour's drive from where I live, and at rush hour -- a lousy time to drive to town and a busy time out hyar on the ranch. So I'm more of an online participant and contributor.
I'll do what I can to add material, photos, etc. It would be interesting to hear from more individuals about the flavor of the Dean campaign in their particular area -- and particular what the mix of people is.
jjorge
I've about decided to get on the Dean wagon. I don't have much time and no real money to help with, but, my voice and moral support will from now on be there.
A suggestion (an idea derived from Edgar's avatar!): Let's press the blog and the campaign to stress the individuality of Dean supporters,not let the NYTimes get away with broad-brushing us as aging hippies, etc. etc. Let's begin to post small bios of Dean supporters, photos when permissable and possible. Let's stress the actual diversity.
8.30.03
Yesterday I had a busy day in my 'Other life'.
From 7:15 to 9am , myself and a couple of others were doing our now regular Friday morning thing --ie. waving Dean signs at commuters from an overpass of highway 195 in Providence. In the lingo that I am learning this is a 'Visibility Event'.
We are getting lots of honks and waves from commuters passing our location!! Interestingly, we are also getting honks from quite a few
truckers on big rigs --presumably they are not the 'Birkenstock Liberals' who, according to some pundits, are the only non-college kids supporting Howard Dean.
Overlooking our location on the pedestrian overpass is a large nursing home which also has an assisted living facility. A few weeks ago a sweet, silver haired, eighty-something,lady from the assisted living facility
walked up to Lance and introduced herself. Her name was 'Imey' and she had seen the Dean signs from her apartment window. She wanted to help.
Yesterday she strolled out to greet us in her Howard Dean tee-shirt.
Imey is now a member of 'Seniors4 Dean,-- seniors4Dean.com -- and she reminded us that we had a 10a.m. meeting with her and a couple of other residents to brainstoem ideas for outreaching to seniors.
I also met Oriana yesterday. She is an energetic, outgoing twenty or thirty-something 'Colombiana'. She has been in the U.S. for ten years and her English is flawless. We spoke in Spanish for a while and she pronounced mine as 'great'. (flattery ALWAYS works with me!)
Oriana is enthusiastic, hard-working and a great addition to our corps of Dean volunteers.
At 3:15pm
I was back on the highway overpass. yesterday was the first day that we were doing the 'Visibility Event' twice. The idea was to wave to the commuters going home (eastbound) and ALSO to wave to all the traffic coming off rte 95 headed for Cape Cod.
We got lots and lots of waves and beeps including a lot more truckers.
I began to realize how INTERACTIVE this sign-waving thing is! When I was able to identify which car was honking, or spot someone waving BEFORE they whizzed by, I waved directly at them and pointed. This may sound silly, but there was a feeling of connectedness, of solidarity.
It feels good.
Oh yes...about those handful who gave us 'thumbs down' or gave us 'the finger'....we waved to them too. No hard feelings.That's what free speech is all about after all!
edgarblythe wrote:jjorge
I've about decided to get on the Dean wagon. I don't have much time and no real money to help with, but, my voice and moral support will from now on be there.
Edgar,
I have always had a lot of respect for you. I'm VERY happy to see that you are 'on the Dean wagon'. Very few of us agree with any candidate on everything, but, I think when you consider the whole package --and look at the incumbent-- Dean looks very good.
Great idea, jjorge! I've been involved with the Dean campaign since June, although not as much as I'd like to. I love the meet-ups, and it's amazing how the support here in Tulsa has grown.
One lady I talked to at one of our meet-ups has voted Republican all her life (she's in her 50's) and now refuses to be involved in any way with the Republican party. I also talked to a man in his mid-twenties who is in the military who says his entire platoon supports Dean over Bush.
To see that Dean supporters aren't all "old hippies" or college kids, you can just look at the photo pages on the Meet-up site. Here are the photos from the Tulsa Meet-up, and links to other cities:
http://dean2004.meetup.com/photos/
My brother was an avid supporter of Goldwater, Reagan, Bush I, and he thought Nixon no more guilty than other politicians (He just got caught). But he feels exactly as I do abought the current administration. GW definitely makes one rethink one's priorities.
Thanks Liberty! Actually, your link took me through the Austin photos, some of which I've taken but not seen online! Tulsa looks as though it has its own contingent of what surprised me in Austin: the numbers of retired, angry, dedicated voters -- grey hairs among the tongue-studs!!
The sheer number of ENGAGED people is what really gets me. The Dean campaign has been brilliant. It gets people involved -- doesn't just come to town, stand on a dais, and preach and run. People who wave flags for Dean are people who go home and write checks, people who will vote.
Must be a cookie -- I thought about that after I posted.
I love the excitement of Dean supporters. It's funny to hear about the others in the run trying to catch up with his internet activity -- but somehow I don't see Gephardt or Kerry supporters getting this active in any form.
If Dean wins the nomination, it will really be something else to see that race take off!
Whichever candidate makes it through the nomination process, watch the Bushies do anything to wipe him out. And yes, I think they are capable of just about anything.
Yeah, they'll get nasty. But, being the optimist that I am, I'm fairly confident that it's going to come around to bite them in the butt during the election campaign.
The thing about Kerry and Gephart, to me, is, they have each had about as many shots as Gore and the public has never gotten excited about them. I like all the candidates, but, I want to win this time.
I will read here, and learn. I have yet to form an opinion. But why is Kerry on the entire "Face the Nation" tomorrow? Are they doing it one at a time?
From the blog:
Family Politics
I wanted to make sure that everyone had seen this quote from an unnamed Democrat working for one of the other candidates regarding upcoming attacks on Howard Dean, that appeared in the August 11, 2003 edition of Time Magazine:
"Its kind of like the Mafia," says a strategist for another Democratic contender. "Everyone wants another family to hit him. You don't want to bring blood into your own house."
******************************************************
I don't think any cynical dem pols --or any Bushies for that matter-- are going to quell the prairie fire that is the Dean campaign.
This is a quick entry as I am off in a couple of minutes for a family gathering in Maine. Naturally I'll have my Dean tee-shirt on ("Make yourself a billboard for Dean", someone said)
I'll have extra tees too, for anyone who wants them, and a few dean flyers.
Gotta go. I'll post again tonight if I get back in time and can keep my eyes open.
--jjorge
A VERY interesting article:
The New Republic,
CAMPAIGN JOURNAL
"Free Fall"
by Ryan Lizza
Post date: 08.28.03
Issue date: 09.08
John Kerry's advisers often talk about the presidential race turning
into a two-tiered contest. "Structurally, the race is absolutely tiered,"
says Jim Jordan, Kerry's campaign manager. The idea is that Howard Dean
and Kerry are in the top tier, and the rest of the field is stuck in
relative obscurity in the second. "There's a very strong likelihood that
the nominee will be either us or Dean," says Jordan. There is a good
reason Jordan describes the race this way. Dean is now the front-runner,
and the fight is on to define his main challenger. But what may be emerging
is actually a different sort of two-tiered race: one where Kerry sinks into
the second tier with his four fellow Washington legislators.
The Kerry campaign looks a little bit like a 1990s tech stock whose
paper profits are slowly being unmasked as accounting gimmicks. Just a
few months ago, other campaigns fretted about Kerry delivering a knockout
punch in Iowa and New Hampshire that would end the race. Kerry aides could
recite from memory statistics showing how the early front-runner in
presidential primaries usually ended up as the party's nominee. The senator
hired the most talented Democratic political consultants, lined up the
earliest endorsements, and turned out the biggest crowds. But, now, as he
embarks on a two-day swing through South Carolina, Iowa, New Hampshire,
and Massachusetts on September 2 and 3, Kerry is slipping out of the top
tier altogether.
By all the traditional yardsticks, the gap between Kerry and Dean is
widening. In Iowa, the latest poll shows Kerry in third place, nine
points behind the former Vermont governor. In New Hampshire, the senator's
backyard, Kerry's support has collapsed. His yearlong lead has vanished,
and he now trails Dean by 21 points in a new Zogby poll. The bleeding in
New Hampshire is across the board--upscale Democrats, blue-collar
Democrats, independents of all persuasions, every age group, and every
area of the state. Even in New Hampshire's Boston suburbs, where Kerry
should be polling strongest, Dean leads 40 to 21. "The bottom is falling
out," says John K. White, a political scientist at Catholic University who
writes a regular, in-depth analysis of Zogby's polls. "Can he still recover?
Sure. But this is stunning and devastating."
In terms of fund-raising, Kerry's steady prowess during the first half
of the year has been eclipsed by Dean's small-donor machine. Despite
adopting some of the trappings of the Dean operation--a blog, Meetup.com,
online contests--neither Kerry nor any of the other campaigns have had the
guts topublicly announce their fund-raising goals. They were left, like
everyone else in politics last week, shaking their heads in amazement as they
watched a crudely drawn baseball bat on Dean's website turn red as it
tracked online donations that poured in at a rate of more than $10,000 an hour
for four days.
Dean's fund-raising goal for this quarter is $10 million--the record amount
Bill Clinton raised in the fall of 1995--which means the campaign,
unlikely to set a target it can't reach, is confident it can raise millions
more during that period. Kerry aides concede they won't match that amount.
Money was once a key rationale for the Kerry candidacy, especially when
there was talk the senator would opt out of the public-financing system
and tap his wife's fortune. But Kerry closed the door on that possibility
in March. Now it's Dean who may opt out of the system because he could
potentially raise so much more than the $45 million the public-financing
laws allow him to spend.
Then there are the crowds. This week, both men were in Chicago to speak
at a union convention. At a campaign event on Monday, Kerry chatted with
a handful of veterans at the Navy Pier. The next day, Dean spoke before
3,500 supporters in the same spot. To be fair, Dean was on a much-hyped
tour of the country. Kerry's big summer tour isn't until next week. But
the differences are still glaring. On Dean's nine-city, coast-to-coast
campaign swing this week, he stubbornly avoided Iowa, New Hampshire, and
South Carolina. Instead, he touched down in places like Washington,
Virginia, and Wisconsin, states that vote early in the nominating process
(February 7, 10,and 17, respectively) but that have received almost no
attention from the other presidential candidates. Kerry's trip, by contrast,
takes him only to the three early states and Massachusetts. And, at the
end of his tour, Dean announced he would soon be running ads in Washington
and Wisconsin as well as in Arizona, New Mexico, South Carolina, and Oklahoma,
states that vote on February 3, and of course Iowa and New Hampshire. That
means that, five months before any Democrat has voted, Dean will have been on
the air in eight of the first 15 caucus and primary states. Kerry hasn't
started running ads yet.
But this widening gap between Kerry and Dean may not be all bad for the
Massachusetts senator. At least it is forcing him to turn his campaign's
focus from process to message. Back when Kerry was christened The
Front-Runner, his greatest selling points were insider trivia, such as
the fact that in New Hampshire he had garnered the most endorsements from
"PoliticsNH.com's 105 list of most important Democratic endorsements"
(yes, there is actually such a list). His campaign didn't just round up
interest groups and sign up talent (remember the Shrum primary?), it seemed
to be about rounding up interest groups and signing up talent. "Up to this
point in time, it's been politics, and fund-raising, and endorsements," says
a senior adviser.
Now, Kerry is pivoting to a candidacy of message, while Dean's may be
turning into a candidacy of process. Fund-raising marathons, Internet
tools, TV advertisements, plane trips, baseball bats, quirky staffers,
rising poll numbers--the Dean campaign serves up a never-ending diet of
process stories. But it's hard to discern the Dean message that is buried
beneath all the excitement about blogging and crowd sizes. This is where
Kerry's campaign sees its opening. "He kicks up so much dust to make sure
voters never ask, 'Is this man ready to be leader of the free world?'"
says Jordan. Voters are looking for a man of strength, experience, and sound
judgment. Once the campaign is on that turf, and not the Internet and fly-arounds,
that's when we will show our real strength."
And that of course is where Vietnam comes in. Dean's emergence means
Kerry will now emphasize his Vietnam service even more (if that is possible).
For one, Kerry's crumbling poll numbers in New Hampshire mean he has to
build a firewall against Dean elsewhere. In a major tactical shift, Kerry will
actually declare his candidacy in South Carolina, which is rich with
members
of the military and home to a large and well-organized population of
veterans. In other early, post-New Hampshire states that are more
conservative than Iowa and New Hampshire, such as Arizona, Oklahoma,
Virginia, and Tennessee, Kerry is betting his military bonafides will
also help.
In addition to drawing this distinction with Dean on stature, Kerry will
contrast Dean's anger with a more hopeful message, "a positive,
optimistic vision of what we can offer America," according to an aide.
And, ideologically, he will hammer Dean from the right for advocating the
full repeal of the Bush tax cuts.=
Vietnam, optimism, tax cuts. It's a good contrast to Dean. But it sounds
like the message of an establishment front-runner who is trying to pivot
tothe general election. And the reality is that Kerry is no longer the
front-runner, and his biggest challenge isn't winning over the general
electorate but winning back the partisan Democrats who abandoned him for
Dean. "He's stressing his Vietnam experience and optimism," says White.
"That's really important for the general election, but that's not where the
primary electorate is at." Kerry is slipping into the second tier, to
his campaign's terminology, but he seems to be clinging to a plan
designedfor a first-tier candidate. Maybe his message will catch on, but right
now he looks like a candidate in denial.
Terrific article, Jorge, from a (to me) unexpected quarter.
The Kerry campaign looks a little bit like a 1990s tech stock whose
paper profits are slowly being unmasked as accounting gimmicks.
Very nicely put!
Now it's Dean who may opt out of the system because he could
potentially raise so much more than the $45 million the public-financing
laws allow him to spend.
That's a surprise to me, and a tad worrying...
On Dean's nine-city, coast-to-coast
campaign swing this week...
It was successful, I think, but most of all it showed his tirelessness, his tenacity, something Bush is sorely lacking in. By contrast, Bush is a limousined rich man's kid, playing at politics. In fact, Dean's pop wasn't that badly off, but Dean thrives on hard work.
At least it is forcing him [Kerry] to turn his campaign's
focus from process to message.... while Dean's may be
turning into a candidacy of process....
That has worried me since May-June. The blog reflects that, and depresses me. It's all process and self-congratulation. I keep hoping for an issues blog...
Kerry will contrast Dean's anger with a more hopeful message, "a positive, optimistic vision of what we can offer America,"
I can't see a single Dean supporter jumping ship for one of those "positive, optimistic visions," can you?
his biggest challenge isn't winning over the general electorate but winning back the partisan Democrats who abandoned him for
Dean.
Well , exactly.
From the article:
Quote:"But it's hard to discern the Dean message that is buried
beneath all the excitement about blogging and crowd sizes. This is where
Kerry's campaign sees its opening. "He kicks up so much dust to make sure
voters never ask, 'Is this man ready to be leader of the free world?'"
says Jordan. Voters are looking for a man of strength, experience, and sound
judgment. Once the campaign is on that turf, and not the Internet and fly-arounds,
that's when we will show our real strength."
I agree, and that's where I've seen the most criticism of Dean, and where he and his supporters need to focus. We need to get his plan for economic revival into focus as well as his vision of foreign policy
All the issues are on his web page, but I think they could be easier to find (i.e. links within links have better info than the actual info presented on his page) and also more prominent.
Tartarin:
Quote: Kerry will contrast Dean's anger with a more hopeful message, "a positive, optimistic vision of what we can offer America,"
I can't see a single Dean supporter jumping ship for one of those "positive, optimistic visions," can you?
Like you said before, so many supporters are the truly pissed - as we should be!
(edited to remove links that didn't work anyway)
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