I am quite sorry for disagreeing with people who see the voter registration purge as a non-issue. Today, I decided to put my fear of another stolen election into action. I signed up with Counsel for Change.
If you are a lawyer or have other relevant expertise, please sign join me. If you know a lawyer, please cajole them into joining too.
I signed up for the full boat. I will provide a car, I will travel, I will work several days leading up to the election. I will travel to either a state where the voter purge is already accused of being illegal (Michigan), a state they stole at least once already (Ohio) or to a state I think could be turned purple at least with enough elbow grease (Indiana).
So help me along as I decide how I will help Obama over the next few days and up to the election. The short of it
I need to know how to volunteer to register voters in NE Indiana
I need to know how much it would cost to receive credit card payments on PayPal
I need this to go viral
I know most attorneys can't dedicate as much time and travel as I. The only reason I can do this is because I am an unemployed attorney, or more favorably, someone still looking for his first attorney job since being admitted a few months ago.
I should be looking for a new job is what I should be doing, but I decided today, without consulting whereisboblafollette's partner, that I am going to volunteer to register voters. I would canvass or phone bank, but I was trained in litigation, and much too argumentative to do any good.
I thought about registering voters in one of three states that I can commute to a couple/few days a week from where I live: Illinois, Wisconsin, or Indiana. While I am aware of tangential benefits to registering voters everywhere, Obama will win in IL and that is my utmost concern. Wisconsin was moved to toss up yesterday, but I believe one can register at the polls in Wisconsin, so GOTV is going to be much more important and I hope to be pre-occupied in Michigan, Ohio or Indiana at that time.
So please direct me to where I can help register voters in NE Indiana!!
Another side effect of being an unemployed attorney is next to zero dollars. I really admire those of you who have maxed out while I have not been able to give a dime. It's hard being poor. Sometimes I wish I had, I don't know, about $2300 just to spend on whatever I want. But I'm not greedy. I would gladly spend any lesser amount.
So what I propose is this...If this is a popular idea, I will open a PayPal account. I will scan and fax the Constitutional Law outline I made as I prepared to take the Multistate Bar Examination to people who put money into that PayPal account. Even those with only a few bucks could gain access to this valuable resource. Not sure what I will do with the money, but I will post a future diary outlining my expenditures.
And then something else occurred to me. I bet many, many poor Kossacks have valuable information that they too could email to other Kossacks. Intro Psych class notes, recipes, gardening tips, theories on why the 10:6 curveball has gone out of fashion, etc. Wouldn't it be great if thousands of Kossacks with disposable income were able to help out the poorer Kossacks and receive valuable information in return?
Well that's my plan anyway. I could use your input, including input from members of Counsel for Change who were better in Contracts than I and those familiar with election and campaign finance laws to let me know what to expect as a volunteer.
UPDATE: Thanks for the props, encouragement and info folks. Sure would like a little more input on products and services I could sell to make money to donate to Obama.