Nation-Building

challenge a band of Howard Dean supporters. I've been watching this campaign since last October or so. I became a supporter before the war in Iraq happened. I worried we'd always be an asterisk in the history of American politics. Even if it ends tomorrow, we've rewritten the whole book. When I saw that the campaign was going to challenge us to raise a million dollars over five days, I thought they might be jumping the gun. Then I saw that before I even saw it at 8:30 MDT, they had already raised almost $100,000. The first day isn't over and we look likely to crack at least a quarter million. A month ago that was our four-day goal. Now it's a warm-up. People occasionally ask me if Dean is peaking too early. I tell 'em we're only getting started. Pat yourselves on the back. Then, stand up and keep fighting.

Well, I suppose I can fill in the details of what I hinted at the other day. Dean for America has generously offered to let me tag along for part of the Sleepless Summer Tour . I'll be cross-posting both here and over on the O-blog with reports from Seattle, Spokane, Austin, and San Antonio. I've got my flights booked, my car rented, my digicam batteries charged, and my accomodations arranged (thanks Daniel - you rock!). I'm really looking forward to getting out of Texas even if only for a day. The Seattle weather will be a welcome respite from the 100+ degree heat we've been tolerating for the past month. Plus, I hear Seattle has some great vegetarian restaraunts (don't get me started on how hard it is to find a vegan meal down here in steak country) and microbrews. Most of all, I'm excited about meeting Dean supporters from across the country. The community that we are collectively building continues to inspire me. When I put out the call for ...

Dean penned an op-ed today in the WSJ (registration reqd) - and nails Bush for putting ideology first, America second: When companies cut back on health-care benefits and guaranteed pensions, workers are hit hard. Studies by scholars, including Karen Kornbluh of the New America Foundation, show that families compensate by running harder, and that stress can become unbearable. There are elderly parents to care for, children to educate, and the need to save for a secure retirement. Married couples now work 10 weeks longer each year than they did in 1968, and live with an accumulation of debt that threatens financial disaster. As Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Tyagi point out in their forthcoming book "The Two Income Trap," today's two-income families earn 75% more money than their single-income counterparts did a generation ago, but they actually have less money to spend. For many, personal bankruptcies have become the rule rather than the exception. This year more chil...

Pejman Yousefzadeh looks for problems with candidate blogging and finds some , or so he says: Consider Dean's weblog as well. The overwhelming majority of the entries are authored by campaign staffers who use the blog to announce future campaign events, discuss the state of the Dean campaign in how it is faring in the presidential horserace, and put forth stories about the latest Dean appearances, and campaign happenings. All of this is a clever use of the Web to keep Dean in the news, but it does nothing to provide a fresh perspective on issues that Dean believes to be important. It certainly doesn't help that Dean himself rarely blogs on his own site, and that campaign staffers have to take such a giant role in serving as Dean's voice on the blog. One cannot help but wonder whether this excessive reliance on campaign staffers to write his campaign weblog indicates that Dean is too much a creature of his handlers, without anything serious or unique to say to the people ...

The campaign has started a new fundraising drive - to raise $1 million dollars by the end of the Sleepless Summer Tour! Yesterday George Bush took time off from his vacation to go fundraising again, this time in Portland, Oregon. At just one event he brought in $1 million from 500 of his biggest contributors. Outside the fundraiser more than 2,000 Americans gathered to speak out against Bush’s failed policies, which have ruined our economy and damaged our standing in the world community. Yet pocketing $1 million dollars was enough for George W. Bush to thank the people of Portland for their “warm welcome.” We can’t let George W. Bush continue to rack up millions while the American people are left out in the street. Today, we’re bringing out the bat on the Dean for America website—and putting it up against George W. Bush. Our goal is to raise $1 million against George Bush by the end of the Sleepless Summer Tour—midnight this Tuesday, August 26th. Show George Bush that you are ...

Check out this week's Seven Days "Inside Track" article... it's a must read. Very funny about the oppo research going on here in Vermont by other campaigns. Peter Freyne is our hometown 'thorn in the side' for Vermont pols. He's one of the best in the business at skewering the best wafflers in the biz - on both sides of the aisle. If you're not already reading it online, check it out. He usually reports on the goings-on of the Dean campaign from a Vermont perspective. This week he writes that 'The snoops are in town!' An excerpt below: "The other day a young woman stopped by Channel 17 on North Winooski Avenue. That’s our local government/public-access station on Burlington-area cable TV. Monica Lesmerises went through the station’s computerized logs trolling for tapes that included someone named “Howard Dean.” According to Channel Director Jess Wilson, there were 230 matches. Monica carefully selected 33 she wanted copied and shipped t...

Click on the title -- it's a must-see. And don't forget, today is "Flood the Zone" Friday !