I get mail from Hillary, Kerry, Edwards, Kennedy, and more, DSCC DCCC, and more. Right now we made the decision to donate to DFA and DNC. Everyone has to make their own choice. That way we are not putting all our eggs in one basket.
They will give states some leeway, but since DNC is footing the bill I imagine there will be some accountability. I for one intend to demand it. Our state chair is already leaving state committeewomen and men out of the decision loop. Even vice chairs are not included in huge decisions. We are going to call her on it. The list of states will probably be coming out soon.
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I am happy to report to you that, as of this morning, we are halfway through rolling out the 50-state strategy that you mandated. We've hired organizers and moved resources into 25 states. And thanks to your commitment -- including record fundraising from ordinary Americans -- the plan is ahead of schedule.
I can't overstate how revolutionary this change is for our party. We've put people and resources on the ground in half the states -- and before the end of the year we will have moved into every single one.
Regional organizers are the core of this program. Nearly ninety have been recruited so far, and more come on every day. These are local people being hired to work in their own states -- they know the terrain, and they are committed to our party's success.
That commitment is what I want to talk to you about. This is a huge new financial commitment for our party. You kick-started it by raising the money to get the first few states off the ground, but we're not going to be able to meet our commitments in one-off fundraising drives. We're only going to be able to do this by finding people who will make a commitment and stick to it.
The beauty is, it only takes a small commitment from any one of us. Republicans raise $10 million every month in huge checks from corporate interests. But if a million working people give just $20 a month, we can out-raise them and reshape the political landscape. The Democracy Bonds program is about building a community of people who have made that commitment -- make yours now:
http://www.democrats.org/democracybondsThe organizers we've hired have also made huge personal commitments -- we have asked every one of them to come on for a minimum obligation of four years. They left their jobs and committed to stay with us no matter what.
That's not how things are usually done in the political world -- in this business, people don't usually stay in the same job for very long. There's always another campaign to work on, or some organization gearing up for the next election.
Until now, the national party has encouraged this system. We have made the same mistake every election cycle -- during the last few months before the presidential election we build a huge organization, and then dismantle it as quickly as possible.
That's not how we're going to do it anymore. You mandated change, and we're moving fast down the road of building a permanent infrastructure in every single state.
But we can't change the way we do business without changing the way we finance our party. That's why every one of us that believes in changing the way things work needs to make the Democracy Bond commitment -- it's the only way it will happen:
http://www.democrats.org/democracybondsWhat do these organizers do? Let me give you an example. In Ohio next Tuesday there will be an election to fill a vacant seat in Congress. It's a heavily Republican district -- the Republican who left Congress to take a Bush job won with over 70 percent of the vote last year. Republicans outnumber Democrats two to one.
In years past, no one would have bothered to even try here. But we have a candidate who decided to fight. His name is Paul Hackett -- he's a former Marine Major, and if elected he'll be the first and only Iraq war veteran in Congress.
And he's not the only one who decided to fight -- grassroots Democrats on the ground, in the district and across the country have been energized by Hackett's fresh ideas and straight talk. Small donations have poured in through the campaign's website and volunteers are showing up at campaign headquarters around the clock.
Our organizers -- who were already on the ground in Ohio -- helped bring things together. Hundreds of volunteers have been turning out to canvass the district because the network was already in place.
Whether we win or lose this election, the work our organizers have been doing all over Ohio helped make this an opportunity for Democrats to come together and fight. That means that we will have a stronger operation to turn out more Democratic votes when Ohio elects a governor and a Senator next year -- and more votes when Ohio goes for the Democratic presidential candidate in 2008.
This is just one congressional district in one state. We need to make this happen everywhere -- and we need to make it happen for the long term. That's why all of us need to make the Democracy Bond commitment:
http://www.democrats.org/democracybondsOf course, not every state is like Ohio. And people often ask why we're putting organizers on the ground not just in Ohio, but in places like Mississippi and Nebraska as well.
The fact is that we have a responsibility to be everywhere -- because our party brings hope. Hope for reform, hope for true participation in our democracy and hope for a government that works for the people, not special interests or ideologues.
We're putting organizers on the ground in places like Mississippi because they need that hope the most. Mississippi has an extremist Republican governor who wants to cut off tens of thousands of children and elderly people from their health care -- and handful of Democrats in the legislature are the only thing stopping him.
We'll be there -- and we will be everywhere else, with your commitment:
http://www.democrats.org/democracybondsThis is about more than just building a national political party -- it's about connecting people with their democracy again. It's about energizing people at the local level to come together and fight for the common good and a government that's clean, honest, and solves real problems.
The Republicans take the completely opposite view. They view our government as an extension of their partisan machine.
They have people like Karl Rove, the White House Deputy Chief of Staff, who thinks that his partisan political goals trump our national security.
We can do better than that -- and Americans in every single state and territory deserve better than that. So we're going to build our party everywhere and take on every fight -- because we want to do things differently.
Thank you for being a part of it.
Yours sincerely,
Tom McMahon
Executive Director
Democratic National Committee
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