In last Saturday's diary, I brought Kossacks up to speed on the story of the peoples' fight against the corrupt Watauga County Board of Elections' shenanigans. When the local Democratic Party decided we were going to fight back against all odds, we were told, "It's all over. We can't beat the power." We were told, "There's no use in taking them on. We can't win." We were told, "Let's just move on. There's nothing we can do."
No go. The Watauga County Democratic Party decided to take good aim at the local and State Board of Elections, exposing them to the light for all to see. We saw our fight as a David and Goliath story and that even if we couldn't bring them down in one deadly crash to hard ground, we could sure as hell lasso a kneecap.
As we relentlessly gathered and threw stones bare-handed, the local and statewide press began to sniff that something was indeed amiss at the Watauga County Board of Elections. Rachel Maddow decided our fight was worth bringing to the nation.
And then, this week, as we crowded into the Watauga BOE Board meeting room with reporters from Charlotte and Winston-Salem, lo and behold surfaced the "BOE meeting minutes" scandal, and Rachel decided boulders were more in order:
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While Watauga County Board of Elections Democratic member and newly-discovered progressive heroine, Kathleen Campbell, attended the statewide Board of Elections meeting in Cary, NC, (where all the North Carolina Press showed up to see what might be up), statewide reporters began to air stories like these (I am having trouble with embed codes this morning--don't you dare let the hot links frustrate you from taking the time to view both the narratives and the videos):
Check out this one
and this one
and this one
When all was said and done, Rachel decided to take a trip to Elizabeth City, NC for a larger story on the big picture of voter suppression in North Carolina, and she sent a team to Watauga for what resulted in a funny and enlightening view of exactly what students were up against in voting in Boone:
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So now what. Where do we go next?
Our fingernails are broken, but our determined spirit is not. We have been told in every inch of our struggle that we can't win, that the fix is in. But we are not giving up. We are determined to win this battle and show weary state progressives that if indeed our destiny is to be dragged kicking and screaming into the abyss, we're going to take every single one of the bad guys with us.
We may be little "davids" in the scheme of things, but we've gathered bigger stones. There's now a team of attorneys working right here in Watauga County dedicated to sniffing out any and all feasible legal actions against both our local and State Board of Elections. They have a smorgasbord of possible legal avenues in both federal and state courts. And we have formed the Voting Rights Task Force, a Watauga County led coalition of organizations and individuals dedicated to fighting Watauga County voter suppression and exporting our ideas and strategies to other North Carolina counties.
We are hearing from progressives from all over the nation--cheering us on, counting on us, and sharing their own personal and inspirational stories of struggle. THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT! If you've got the means and would like to help us out financially, we'd be most appreciative. If you can't, that's A-Okay, but we'd still love to hear from you.
Want to read more? Here ya go:
Winston-Salem Journal
The Appalachian (Student Newspaper Editorial)
WSOCTV
Raleigh News & Observer
Under the Dome
Think Progress
High Country Press