There are a lot of heroes in this election - there is a lot of credit to share for our great victory. The bulk of it, I feel, is due to the candidates who stepped forward and put their names up for consideration, in districts red and blue, contesting incumbents and open seats. These brave souls stepped outside of their routine, faced (and faced down) legendary opposition, spent countless hours on the phone asking strangers for money, wore out shoes and ate rubber chicken and kielbasa 'til it was coming out of their pores. They withstood slander and media scrutiny and an unending stream of bad advice and criticism.
Coleen Rowley is one of those heroes; she is the former FBI whistleblower who ran for Congress in Minnesota's second district. You can help her out at the WGYB ActBlue page Her plea for support is in the extended entry.
Thanks for any help you can give! I've made the decision to try to retire my own campaign debt by taking out a second mortgage which is going to amount to about $30,000. In 26 years of marriage, my husband and I have never carried any credit card debt from one month to a next so this is quite traumatic, but... we'll make it through. Here's my thank you:
THE LAST GREAT THANK YOU!
Thank you for believing that change was possible.
Thank you for your encouragement.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you for your money.
Thank you for your moral support.
But most of all, thank you for TRYING.
Now some may not agree that it’s the trying that matters. Certainly many people, more than ever before, seem to believe the opposite, that it’s only winning that matters. From the start of the campaign in CD2, there were those who countered my idealistic sounding “always try!” with the more utilitarian “results matter.” Some of you may even have lost the faith along the way or lost it at the end when, disappointment of disappointments, we got beat by Kline’s million dollar Rovian negative ad machine.
But I think it’s been scientifically proven that energy (or trying) is never lost. It just changes its form. So Plans B and C and D and E are already rising from the new energy that’s been gained. And guess what some of that energy is going to go towards? Unless John Kline finally sees the light, apologizes for his past mistakes and then makes good on his pledges to “reach across the aisle” and “get things done,” he’s going to be in big trouble come November 2008!
My personal Plan B is to do what I can to reduce some of the difficulty that hampers such changes from occurring. That means tackling the money and power entwined in funding campaigns and producing the terrible negative ads which give a good work out to our remote control “mute” buttons every couple years but do nothing to inform voters and promote democracy. If we can put a man on the moon, we should be able to come up with some ways to reform campaign financing, reduce the negative ads and, at the same time, address a good part of the special interest corruption that plagues Congress. At least I intend to try.
Finally I need to extend one more desperate apology to all of you who might have given too much of your beliefs, encouragement, time, money, moral support and trying to this campaign and now wonder how anyone thought it possible to drive a square peg into a round hole. All’s I can promise is I, for one, am going to keep hammering. I didn’t convert to liberal, come out of the closet this way, for one short 16 month campaign, but for the long haul, which God-willing, might mean another 40 or so years of banner waving, door knocking and working for candidates and causes that matter. So I apologize that your investment may take longer than expected to see results but it wasn’t wasted.
Thanks again and hope to see many of you working with renewed energy on one or more of the plans for change. Always try! Coleen Rowley
Can't you help Coleen just a bit? Don't you want her rarin' to go again in '08? It's simple: just click. Thanks!