I think at some point we're going to have to define our terms a little bit better. These are going to be three organizations with roughly the same goals: acting as a liberal/reformist watchdog for the Democratic party, defeating President Bush, and gaining Democratic control of the House and Senate. They're all drawing from the same group of volunteers and donors, although exactly how big that number is remains to be seen.
I'm not concerned that there won't be enough money and time to go around, but I am worried that the three of us are going to be acting independently instead of in concert, where we can not only influence the races in November but really build up a blogosphere influence on the party.
I have no idea what kind of communication there is between Dean, Trippi, and our distinguished host, but the more that flows between them the better. There's a place for real distinctions, but the more harmony the better. It doesn't help much that all three are being pretty tight-lipped about what exactly their plans are, outside of the broadest terms.
I see several different missions that we can divvy up between the three groups. The first of these is winning the House - winning and protecting competitive districts. Kos is well on top of this, and I think he might have a logical lead.
The second is working against Bush, which is everyone's most important goal in November and should be the domain of everyone involved.
Thirdly, we can focus on taking back the Senate, which is a distinctly different project from the House. Internet advertising won't be as effective, and this is where we can really allocate our manpower and our money in a large scale. Howard's got the 650,000 e-mail list, and I think this could work well for DFA2.
Fourthly, we can act as an ideological counter to the Heritage foundation and their kind and all that and provide talking points, issue by issue. There's a lot of talk of including this at CFA, and Trippi's staff is more trained and focused and could work well at this. Kos, with it's (small-d) democratic nature is a little too disorganized.
Fifth, we can recruit candidates and nurture the candidacies of liberal leaning Democrats. DFA1 has a project with that now, and both they and Kos can work well on this.
Finally, there's the open action part of it, working beyond elections to take on whatever malfeasence the Republicans are trying to get away with. Going after the media (the Dean Defense Forces) as well as the administration is an important part of this, but for specific, actionable events. This is clutch for Kos, working alongside moveon.org.
It doesn't leave much for CFA, although I think they might be the ideal group to directly interact with incumbent Congresspeople and Washington folks.
Thoughts, please! We're building consciousness and identity around here, and the more aware we are of it the better.