Feingold for Michigan Organizing
So I have a dilemma.
The accepted view is that Hillary Clinton is the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination (This still may not end up happening-- a lot can happen; however, for the sake of this post, let us assume that this is true). She's got the name recognition without being "damaged goods" like Senators Kerry and Edwards. I think that a lot of her support will drop once the race gets going, and especially when people see what they could have with a President Feingold, but she'll still be the frontrunner.
There's also a widely-held view that after the first few primaries, the race will come down to two or three people, Hillary and the "anti-Hillary," as some are saying. Obviously I want that second or third person to be Russ Feingold.
We can make that happen by building the network of support to allow Senator Feingold to come in a strong second against Senator Clinton in Iowa and New Hampshire, if not winning them outright. And we can strenghten him further still if we, as Michiganians (or Michiganders, your choice), can deliver to Senator Feingold our delegates. That's what I'd like to talk about.
Without a clear primary schedule worked out, we have no way of knowing how important Michigan will be, but Levin and Stabenow have been working to try to gain us a prominent spot, so we could be a critical state. For the sake of this post, let us assume we will be. A Feingold win here could provide the momentum to carry the Midwest and win the nomination.
So how do we do it? How do we build the grassroots network for Russ Feingold in Michigan? How do we get his name out there, and how do we get people excited about him?
At RussForPresident.com, there are some ideas already being formulated about billboards in Wisconsin, Iowa, and perhaps a few other places. Perhaps a well placed billboard in Ann Arbor? But surely we can do better than that! What else can we do?
I'm afraid I don't have the political experience of running a campaign. I've never organized something large like this before. However, I do know one thing: the collective knowledge and skills of the people brought together by the internet is astounding. We can come up with a way to do this!
What ideas have you got? Good comments will be promoted to the front page, for further discussion.
I've cross-posted this at Michigan Liberal in hopes of getting a little more traffic. Any other places I should post it?
The accepted view is that Hillary Clinton is the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination (This still may not end up happening-- a lot can happen; however, for the sake of this post, let us assume that this is true). She's got the name recognition without being "damaged goods" like Senators Kerry and Edwards. I think that a lot of her support will drop once the race gets going, and especially when people see what they could have with a President Feingold, but she'll still be the frontrunner.
There's also a widely-held view that after the first few primaries, the race will come down to two or three people, Hillary and the "anti-Hillary," as some are saying. Obviously I want that second or third person to be Russ Feingold.
We can make that happen by building the network of support to allow Senator Feingold to come in a strong second against Senator Clinton in Iowa and New Hampshire, if not winning them outright. And we can strenghten him further still if we, as Michiganians (or Michiganders, your choice), can deliver to Senator Feingold our delegates. That's what I'd like to talk about.
Without a clear primary schedule worked out, we have no way of knowing how important Michigan will be, but Levin and Stabenow have been working to try to gain us a prominent spot, so we could be a critical state. For the sake of this post, let us assume we will be. A Feingold win here could provide the momentum to carry the Midwest and win the nomination.
So how do we do it? How do we build the grassroots network for Russ Feingold in Michigan? How do we get his name out there, and how do we get people excited about him?
At RussForPresident.com, there are some ideas already being formulated about billboards in Wisconsin, Iowa, and perhaps a few other places. Perhaps a well placed billboard in Ann Arbor? But surely we can do better than that! What else can we do?
I'm afraid I don't have the political experience of running a campaign. I've never organized something large like this before. However, I do know one thing: the collective knowledge and skills of the people brought together by the internet is astounding. We can come up with a way to do this!
What ideas have you got? Good comments will be promoted to the front page, for further discussion.
I've cross-posted this at Michigan Liberal in hopes of getting a little more traffic. Any other places I should post it?
posted by Fitzy at 9:29 PM
2 Comments:
It is still early, but as the time nears I would be willing to help with beginning to lay the groundwork. I do have some previous experience doing this sort of thing.
In the meantime I think it is good to have the presence of this blog online so that people in our state that are interested might stumble upon it.
Other than that, we could start collecting names and email addresses of people in the state. Building a list of interested folks now would be helpful later on when it becomes time to get down to work. This site might be a good place to solicit that sort of info from visitors.
One last thought too. Perhaps we could contact the Senator through the Progressive Patriots Fund and tell him we would like to see him make a swing though Michigan at some point and offer to help organize the events.
Keep blogging.
Don't forget writing letters to the editor. There's still a thing or two here and there about the 2008 presidential race. When a MI paper does a run down of candidates and Russ gets left out, write a letter to the editor. I live in WI, so his name recognition here is pretty good, but since you live in MI, there is more opportunity to raise awareness. Just a thought...
F.O.M.
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