The Future of the 50-State Strategy

I just got this email from the organization Democracy for America.

What a great week, right? Finally, we have a President intent on getting America back on track and he hasn't waited a single day to get started.

But why can't we say the same thing about his leadership of the Democratic Party?

The 50 State Strategy will go down as one of the most successful long-term programs the DNC has ever implemented, providing resources for increasing voter registration, maintaining a national voter file available to local parties, developing leaders at all levels of office, and employing official DNC staff in every state.

This week, word leaked from Washington that the DNC might return to the short-sighted policies of the past and only focus real resources on swing states in preparation for the next Presidential election.

If it ain't broke, don't break it. We must step up our aggressive campaign to immediately reinstate the 50 State Strategy...

Yesterday, local DFA members delivered our "Reinstate the 50 State Strategy" petition with signatures and comments representing over one million DFA members nationwide.

We can't sit idle and wait for a response. Local elections for Mayors, City Councils and School Boards are coming up fast. Congressional elections in 2010 will need the grassroots groundwork we lay right now. And in 2012, Barack will need a strong people-powered Democratic Party nationwide.

Since President Obama appointed Gov. Tim Kaine to be the new Chair of the DNC, both Barack and Tim have said many nice words about the 50 State Strategy. But praise is not action and over 200 organizers have been let go with no announced plan to replace them.

Keep up the pressure and make sure Gov. Kaine understands that if it ain't broke, don't break it.

Apparently the Democratic Party is seriously considering doing away with the highly successful 50-State Strategy for political and community organizing and going back to the short-sighted focus on swing states as its main political strategy. This relates to an issue percolating late last year where 200 local community organizers were fired by the DNC after Howard Dean stepped down as DNC chair.

Update: Obama's 50 State Strategy

This is from PoliticalInaction.com

September 19, 2008
SHOCK POLL: Iowa out of play...........

Bush won Iowa in 2004 and 2000. Obama has put Iowa pretty much out of reach. The gold standard of pollsters, SurveyUSA, puts the Iowa race at 54O 43M. That is 7 electoral votes McCain needs.

For what it is worth, 538.com has Obama winning the election 71% of the time.....

UPDATE: By the by, it drives me up a wall that no one in the drive by media talks about the importance of Iowa. 3 key facts:

It is a 14 electoral vote swing in Obama's favor.

It shores up Minnesota, Wisconsin, makes Nebraska's split electoral votes possible, and it gives Obama a fighting chance in Missouri.


Finally, and most importantly, it makes an Obama presidency possible.

Obama has to have multiple ways to the White House.

Why? Because if it was only Ohio and Florida, McCain would camp out in the those states, spend most of his money there, and the smear campaign of Barack Obama would be, and probably still will be, overwhelming.

But here is the thing.....if McCain has to defend multiple places, he can't conduct the vicious attacks without turning off voters somewhere where he is vulnerable. Obama needs to steal the equivalent of Ohio from McCain and protect all other Kerry states. That is 20 electoral votes. He is 33% there. New Mexico gets him 60% of the way there.

That gives him 3 options remaining: Colorado(10), Virginia(13), or Indiana(11). If he didn't have Iowa, he would have to win two of those three, which is probably impossible, or at least not very likely. But with Iowa, he only needs one. This spreads McCain devastatingly thin in message and in resources. McCain has to appeal to a broad swath of people, but he can't do it because he isn't that versatile. Iowa made and now makes Barack Obama possible. Barack Obama's strategy is to bankrupt McCain in Florida and Ohio, then win it with Iowa, Colorado, New Mexico, and Virginia for good measure.

The reason why the 50 State Strategy was the ONLY way for Obama to go IS because he had to be able to weave and bob and get more options. There are polls out in states like Indiana, Montana, North Carolina, where Obama is within the margin of error. States where no Republican should be having to fight, and there it is. Heck, I saw a poll out of West Virginia, that had Obama within FIVE!

WEST VIRGINIA.

What would work for McCain in one state, is a turnoff in another state. While Palin might play well with the GOP base, her religious extremism turns off voters in a state like New Hampshire. Keeeping it within the margin of error in a state like North Carolina, means McCain has to expound resources. With the exception of Michigan and Florida, Obama's Primary battles enabled him to set up infrastructures all across the country.

In a state like Florida, remember this: since the 2004 election,
a)ex-felons have had their voting rights restored,
b)the Latino population that is NOT Cuban has exploded and is sizeable,
c)there is a sizeable YOUTH Cuban voting block.

Palin's selection HAS hurt McCain with Jewish voters to the point now, where they've tampered back with the 'Obama is a Muslim' LIE email, and began mailing out fliers connecting Barack Obama to PAT BUCHANAN (I kid you not). Florida is going to come down to GOTV, plain and simple. Palin's selection put Florida in play.

So, if you can phonebank, or if you can canvass in one of these battleground states, please do.

Obama Will Staff Up In Every State!

From DailyKos:

I just received an email (as most of you probably did!) from Steve Hildebrand, deputy campaign manager for Obama, as follows:

Today, I am proud to announce that our presidential campaign will be the first in a generation to deploy and maintain staff in every single state.

The network of volunteers and the infrastructure built up during the historic primary season -- on behalf of all the Democratic campaigns -- have given us an enormous and unprecedented opportunity in the general election.

We need to register new voters and bring people back into the political process. We need to reach out to Independents and Republicans who know that our country cannot afford another four years of George W. Bush's disastrous policies.

FIFTY STATE STRATEGY.

I love it.

I honestly do.

How Obama Won: 50 State Strategy

How Obama Won: 50 State Strategy

Hillary Clinton to Katie Couric: It will be over February 5th.

When you heard Hillary Clinton become the champion of ' counting all the votes'; ' don't let them push me out until all the voters have been heard from', remember what she said to Katie Couric.

It will be over February 5th.

This is what happened February 5th. It was NOT over.

Hillary Clinton thought this was a 400 meter race.

Barack Obama knew it was a 4x400 relay and prepared for battle.

People used to argue that there wasn't much difference between Obama and Clinton. One of my retorts was always that there was a huge difference between them:
One lived by and believed in 50%+1
The other one lived by and believed in The 50 State Strategy

When I say 50%+1, it means that the Democrats would be going back to the same old tired electoral map that they've been using for years. That certain states count, and other states don't, and you shouldn't even bother in those states, even if they have Democrats in them, because we won't win. The 50%+1 is the basis of thought for such books as Whistling Past Dixie:How Democrats Can Win Without the South...which argues that the Democratic Party should just write off the Southern portion of the United States. Well, who makes up the largest share of the Democratic Party in the South? Black voters. A majority of the African-American population in America lives South of the Mason-Dixon. And, you have folks arguing to basically discard their votes. No thank you.

The 50 State Strategy is just that. You fight for the Democratic Party in ALL 50 States. It doesn't matter if it's a Red State; while Democrats might not be able to win it in a Presidential Election, or even a State Election - TODAY -- you drop the seeds by growing the party, so that we can win one small election this time, and next time try for a higher office and so on. That the Democratic Party would fight for Democrats all across America.

If depended upon how you saw politics and what you wanted for the Democratic Party as to which vision was for you.

For me, it was no contest - The 50 State Strategy.

There is a reason why Howard Dean was retained at the DNC by Barack Obama. It's because Obama is a fan of and put to use beyond Dean's wildest dreams, Dean's own 50 State Strategy.

The following posts reference this topic:

Obama Launches Vote For Change, A Massive 50-State Registration Drive

The Attacks on Howard Dean

Hillary "Tonya Harding" Clinton Big Dollar Donors Threaten Pelosi & DCCC


Hillary Clinton and her campaign ignored the caucuses. Since Bill Clinton didn't do well in the Iowa Caucus when he ran, they wrote them all off around the country. Caucuses take time; they take building organization and relationships. They are money intensive, and people intensive for the amount of votes you get from them. They were written off by Camp Clinton; after all, no Democrat actually ' wins' most of these states in the General Election, so why waste your time on a Democratic Party caucus in these states. Once again the 50%+1 Mentality shows its ugly head.

Jack Turner, at JJP, wrote a piece on the contempt Hillary Clinton's Campaign showed for voters in states who went against her: Hillary: Votes Only Count If They Are For Me

There were caucuses in the following places:
Iowa
Nevada
Alaska
American Samoa
Colorado
Idaho
Kansas
Minnesota
North Dakota
Nebraska
Washington
Maine
Hawaii
Texas
Wyoming
Guam

Out of this list, Barack Obama LOST the DELEGATE COUNT in ONE Caucus - American Samoa.

Even though he 'lost' the Nevada Caucus, he received MORE DELEGATES than Hillary Clinton because of his success in RURAL Nevada.

He only tied her in one place, delegate wise - in Guam, which he won by 7 votes.

Everywhere else, he BEAT HER in the caucus states.

His final Pledged Delegate Tally from the Caucuses: 326
Hillary Clintons? : 176

Those little throwaway states, didn't matter to 50%+1 Hillary Clinton. They DID to 50 State Strategy Barack Obama.

Since this was a race for PLEDGED DELEGATES, the Obama 50 State Strategy paid off once again.

Obama Campaign: Howard Dean to Remain as DNC Chair

From DailyKos:

As Obama moves to unify the Democratic Party, he is sending his strategist Paul Tewes to join the DNC. But Howard Dean will remain. Obama campaign spokesperson Bill Burton:

"Senator Obama appreciates the hard work that Chairman Dean has done to grow our party at the grassroots level and looks forward to working with him as the chairman of the Democratic Party as we go forward."

I know we've had our testy moments with Dean, but I'm a fan of the 50 State Strategy, and I see no reason to remove Dean right now.

The Attacks on Howard Dean

hat tip: The Field

From the NYTimes.com:

Democrats’ Turmoil Tests Party’s Low-Key Leader
By ADAM NAGOURNEY
Published: April 2, 2008

WASHINGTON — The turmoil in the Democratic presidential race has presented a sharp test of Howard Dean’s low-profile approach to leading the Democratic National Committee, bringing calls from many Democrats for him to take a more aggressive role in defusing the threat of a protracted and divisive nominating fight.

After months in which he was largely absent from public deliberations about how to avert a risk to the party’s hopes of taking the White House in November, Mr. Dean stepped forward last week to say he wanted the contest resolved by July 1 and for Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama to tone down their attacks on each other.

Yet three years after he won election as the party chairman by running largely as an outsider, it is not clear that Mr. Dean has the political skills or the stature with the two campaigns to bring the nominating battle to a relatively quick and unifying conclusion.

Indeed, 24 hours after he made his remarks, Mrs. Clinton said she intended to keep fighting for the nomination through the summer, if necessary. It was an unmistakable rebuke to Mr. Dean, who has never had good relations with the Clintons.

In an interview, Mr. Dean said he was taking steps to pave the way to a smooth convention in Denver this summer, suggesting that he had had private conversations with both campaigns.

Mr. Dean and his aides said they were assembling resources — voter lists, political organizations and polling on vulnerabilities of Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee. Beyond that, Mr. Dean and other Democrats argued that with the party so divided — and in the midst of a fight between two outsized political figures — there were limits to what he could, or should, do.

“I’m making calls all the time to people,” he said. “I’ve spoken to a great number of leaders who are not aligned. The operative thing here is let the voters get to have their say before the Washington politicians have their say.”
.......................................

Mr. Dean, a reserved former governor of Vermont, goes home most weekends and spends most of his weekdays on the road. In Washington, he stays at a hotel. His approach and style offer a sharp contrast to a string of big-shoulder, high-profile party chairmen —Terry McAuliffe or the late Ron H. Brown — who rose through the party ranks and were fixtures at the parties, fund-raisers and restaurants that make up this city’s political culture and where much of the political conversation takes place.

He in many ways ran for chairman as a candidate defying the Democratic establishment, and his first years were marked by a very public feud with Representative Rahm Emanuel, Democrat of Illinois, over Mr. Dean’s trademark proposal to use Democratic National Committee money to build organizations in all 50 states. He does not have particularly close relationships with many of the people who are central to the Clinton and Obama campaigns or Washington Democratic players.

“I have never heard from him,” said Charles T. Manatt, who was chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1981 to 1985. “But he is a totally different style from someone like me who came in through the party process. Dean doesn’t live in town so he hasn’t connected with a lot of people in town.”

Rest of article at link above.

***************************************************************



I've said it before and I'll say it again:

Time Magazine was right a couple of months ago when they had Clinton and Obama on the cover and the title was

Battle for the Soul of the Democratic Party

They were entirely right. The battle between Clinton and Obama isn't just between two candidates, it's about two entirely opposite and incompatible organizing philosophies.

With the Clintons, you get the 50%+1 strategy. This is a TOP-DOWN way of thinking and organizing, full of big donors, lobbyists, and other political parasites like the Democratic Leadership Council.

With Obama, you get the Dean Originated 50 State Strategy. This is a BOTTOM-UP way of thinking and organizing, full of little people thinking that they could have a say in the way things are run.

The Clintons and their henchmen have been after Dean ever since he ran for DNC Chair. They wanted to stop him then, repeatedly trying to diminish Dean's successes in 2006. The thing is, the Democrats on the ground, who do the grunt work, love Dean, if for no other reason, he actually TALKED to them after years of being ignored by the DNC.

Obama took Dean's 50 State Strategy, studied it, and then filled it in. It's at the root of his success. When Billary didn't have a post-Feb. 5th Strategy, Obama had already organized and had boots on the ground in those post-Feb. 5 States. Obama is winning this because he took every state seriously and organized there. Obama's fundraising success is a shock to the entire political system. Remember, he was laughed at when he said that he wouldn't take Lobbyist or PAC money. Remember, Billary's insistence that she would opt out of public financing was done as a move of INTIMIDATION - because, of course, nobody was supposed to beat the vaunted Clinton fundraising machine. When Obama nearly matched her in that 1st Quarter, the political earthquake was felt, coast to coast. That he has now raised MORE MONEY than anyone in the history of Primary Politics is stunning, and has people just standing there with their mouths agape.

Obama winning the nomination and the Presidency will mean that one strategy will triump over the other, and all of those who had gotten fat and greasy using the 50%+1 Strategy will have to move over.

THAT is what the threatening letter to Pelosi was about.
THAT is what articles like this are about.

They are trying to undermine Howard Dean and move him out. It's all about keeping the Clintons in power. Make no mistake about that.

And that's why, in a way, Obama isn't even about Obama anymore. It's about something bigger. A vision larger than him, about fundamentally, how you want to see politics run.



Related Articles:

How Obama Is Threatening People's Money And Why It's Important For Democracy

Why the War on Obama

Hillary "Tonya Harding" Clinton Big Dollar Donors Threaten Pelosi & DCCC

From DailyKos:

Clinton big dollar donors threaten Pelosi and the DCCC
by kos
Wed Mar 26, 2008 at 02:52:01 PM PDT

Certain people still think they can bully politicians by waving their checkbooks in their faces.

The Honorable Nancy Pelosi
Speaker of the US House of Representatives

Office of the Speaker
H-232, US Capitol
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Madame Speaker,

As Democrats, we have been heartened by the overwhelming response that our fellow Democrats have shown for our party's candidates during this primary season. Each caucus and each primary has seen a record turnout of voters. But this dynamic primary season is not at an end. Several states and millions of Democratic voters have not yet had a chance to cast their votes.

We respect those voters and believe that they, like the voters in the states that have already participated, have a right to be heard. None of us should make declarative statements that diminish the importance of their voices and their votes. We are writing to say we believe your remarks on ABC News This Week on March 16th did just that.

During your appearance, you suggested super-delegates have an obligation to support the candidate who leads in the pledged delegate count as of June 3rd , whether that lead be by 500 delegates or 2. This is an untenable position that runs counter to the party's intent in establishing super-delegates in 1984 as well as your own comments recorded in The Hill ten days earlier:

"I believe super-delegates have to use their own judgment and there will be many equities that they have to weigh when they make the decision. Their own belief and who they think will be the best president, who they think can win, how their own region voted, and their own responsibility.'"

Super-delegates, like all delegates, have an obligation to make an informed, individual decision about whom to support and who would be the party's strongest nominee. Both campaigns agree that at the end of the primary contests neither will have enough pledged delegates to secure the nomination. In that situation, super-delegates must look to not one criterion but to the full panoply of factors that will help them assess who will be the party's strongest nominee in the general election.

We have been strong supporters of the DCCC. We therefore urge you to clarify your position on super-delegates and reflect in your comments a more open view to the optional independent actions of each of the delegates at the National Convention in August. We appreciate your activities in support of the Democratic Party and your leadership role in the Party and hope you will be responsive to some of your major enthusiastic supporters.

Sincerely,

Marc Aronchick
Clarence Avant
Susie Tompkins Buell
Sim Farar
Robert L. Johnson
Chris Korge
Marc and Cathy Lasry
Hassan Nemazee
Alan and Susan Patricof
JB Pritzker
Amy Rao
Lynn de Rothschild
Haim Saban
Bernard Schwartz
Stanley S. Shuman
Jay Snyder
Maureen White and Steven Rattner

The Obama campaign responds:

"This letter is inappropriate and we hope the Clinton campaign will reject the insinuation contained in it. Regardless of the outcome of the nomination fight, Senator Obama will continue to urge his supporters to assist Speaker Pelosi in her efforts to maintain and build a working majority in the House of Representatives," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

One side is looking to build a consensus and win on the strength of voters, the other side is looking to divide and harm the party. It's easy to see which is which.

When people say that Dems can kiss and make up, I don't know about that.

Because, at the heart of this battle is what you want the Democratic Party to look like.

What you believe it should be.

I believe Hillary " Tonya Harding" Clinton, her donors, and the DLC are parasites that have been sucking the life of what Democrats should stand for. They are TOP DOWN.

Barack Obama is of the vision of BOTTOM-UP. Barack Obama is the one who believes in the 50 State Strategy. That all Democrats are worth fighting for, even in the red states. That you plant seeds in order for them to grow in subsequent elections.

What do you believe in?

50% +1

or

50 State

That's what this battle has become, and I'm glad that they're being obvious about it. THE EXTORTION of it all.

If you'd like to drop a line to Nancy Pelosi:

Office of the Speaker
H-232, US Capitol
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-0100