A daily series, Connect! Unite! Act! seeks to create face-to-face networks in each congressional district. Groups regularly socialize but also get out the vote, support candidates and engage in other local political actions that help our progressive movement grow and exert influence on the powers-that-be. Visit us at Daily Kos every morning at 7:30 A.M. Pacific Time to see how you can get involved. The comment thread is fun and light-hearted, but we're serious about moving the progressive political agenda forward.
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The orange pinpoints are the location of each organized group of Daily Kos readers.
If you'd like to join a group, click on a point and a box will pop up showing contact links.
If you'd like to start a group, contact navajo for instructions.
View Interactive Map of Daily Kos Regional Communities in a full screen version.
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Notable Leadership in Colorado is Rewarded
Meteor Blades and I organized three meet-ups in Colorado to boost participation in their state's politics by using the tools at Daily Kos. Below you'll find my summary of each of the events in Denver, Colorado Springs and Durango.
We had a terrific event in Denver on Sunday, July 26th. Monique aka
TealBomb, from our Activism Team, sent an email using a 100 mile radius from the city center which reached 2,215 subscribers of Daily Kos emails. As a result we received 85 RSVPs! In a previous event planning job I learned to expect between 20-30% attrition, so we set the room for less than 85. However our attrition rate was pretty high, 41%. 50 people attended, which is still an excellent number. It was suggested that having it in the afternoon instead of the evening may have led to fewer people attending, hard to determine. Another suggestion, which I'll gladly follow, for these larger meet-ups is to publish an agenda in CUA so people can choose what time is most critical to them. Some only wanted to be at the actual meeting and skip dining.
Now about the attendees. We're finding that the vast majority of the attendees only read at the site, they do not have user IDs. Many had no idea who Markos is. A common question was, "what is Kos?" So we had to temper our conversation with them so as not to use too much insider speak. We learned to avoid jargon that we're used to using at typical meet-ups where the majority is active at the site and saw our event calendar here in CUA. So all past events (Austin, Kansas City, Dallas and Colorado) using our email subscribers produces a majority of attendees who only read and share diaries. I encouraged everyone to sign up at the site and start writing. And, we had two who did!
Today's Kos Meet Up in Kolorado by Reign In the Devils, [complete with photos.]
[...] We got the word, first from our hostess and guide Navajo, then from no less a luminary than Meteor Blades, and also from our man in Denver, Joe, on what we must DO to get out the progressive vote and continue turning America 'round! Get us on the good side! I hope to be starting a some kind of Boulder group to keep the local community informed on news from the various campaigns news in our state. Look for it! Till next time.
I Accept the Kos Invitation by TheAbsurdArtist
Attended a Colorado Kos Community gathering today @ The Merc. [...]
There I was both invited and challenged to join in the Kos Communities conversations by "Logging In" and then posting diary entries and sharing comments.
I accept! [...]
Looking forward to becoming a regularly contributing member of the Kos communities not just in Colorado, but Kos-wide.
And there was a recap in the
Colorado State Open Thread by ColoTim. Here's an excerpt from a very detailed and well written diary:
One of Meteor Blades' prime interests, and past successes, is in getting every precinct to have a Democratic precinct chairman - someone to represent the precinct to the next higher level (district, city, etc), someone to organize the caucus, the representation for candidates for the various meetings and someone who will organize people to go out and spread the word about progressive ideas. Who is your Democratic Precinct chairman/woman? Have you met them, talked with them, volunteered to help them? If the position is vacant, can you fill that role, or do you know someone you can recruit for it?
He doesn't want to settle on a 50 state strategy, or a 435 Congressional District strategy. He wants all 170,000 precincts (give or take) to have Democrats in charge, preferably a progressive Democrat. We have too much at stake to just cede this election and the 2020 census to the Republicans. We've seen what they've done in Wisconsin, Kansas, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida and the rest of the states when they've not been opposed.
A special thanks to Leftcandid and ColoTim for leading the Daily Kos Denver group! Leftcandid spent several hours after the event inputting all the email addresses collected. These two are determined and that's why we made this trip happen!
If you'd like to join Denver Kos, please kosmail Leftcandid.
The following evening, Monday, July 27th, produced our lowest attrition ever, 17%! We had 30 readers attend of the 36 who RSVP'd. We used a 50 miles radius for our email and reached 383 readers in the very Red city of Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak Region.
Another lovely crowd and with the same traits as Denver, people who only read the site. There were only two people there who had a user IDs. We had a great conversation and overall an enjoyable, successful evening. We collected email addresses for thanatokephaloides aka Sean McCullough.
[...] Colorado Springs once was a liberal, progressive city. When my Dad's father was Mayor here (1948-1956), we were strongly invested in public works (the City acquired Memorial Hospital during this time, as well as large expanses of park lands). We had a large, thriving film, theater, music, and artistic community here, with the strong LGBT community one would expect with this kind of activity. Agriculture and light to medium industry, a considerable part of which was unionized (principally the gold and coal mines, h/t JayRaye), also played a large role in our thriving economy.
As to "WTF happened?", that's material for a whole Diary rather than just a Comment. But I'm working on that Diary and will publish it soon.
Meanwhile, I'm here and want to hear from some of my fellow Coloradoans......
I collected more food pr0n there:
Another very successful event, great food, drink and conversation! We both gots lots of hearty handshakes and thank yous.
If you'd like to join Pikes Peak Region Kos, please kosmail thanatokephaloides.
Durango, which is 314 miles from Colorado Springs, was our final destination. Our early evening venue was the beautiful home of
nzanne and her husband. It was very generous of them to host. We had 32 of the 40 RSVPs attend, 20% attrition, but a very manageable group. They filled the great room and decks of nzanne's. We feel fortunate since there were two other competing political events that evening.
We got another first diary out of it:
My first Dkos diary... about flowers by COMTNGRL and it made the Rec List! COMTNGRL said Thinking Fella, the leader of Four Corners Kos, told her she couldn't attend our meet-up unless she signed up at the site. Nice arm bending! She has been lurking for years and knows all the players.
What a pleasure to visit beautiful Durango and the Durangotangs! A special thanks to Thinking Fella for setting such a great example of leadership by winning a seat with his local Democratic Party Executive Committee! Yes! Go Local!
Outstanding leadership in Colorado forced Daily Kos to make a personal appearance.
Go Thinking Fella!
Durango had the largest collection of readers with user names:
L-R: Thinking Fella, mnguitar, COMTNGRL, Meteor Blades, nzanne,
Gary Norton, navajo, Merry Light and Warkman
If you'd like to join Four Corners Kos, please kosmail Thinking Fella.
The entire state of Colorado has almost 50,000 subscribers to our Daily Kos emails. We can't wait to tap into that more. We've got a lot of organizing ahead of us for Colorado. Leaders, please step up!
We've declared this road trip a great success and look forward to doing some more around the country. It's important to unite entire states in addition to cities and towns. I hope you'll contribute in some way to this effort. Let's talk in the comment section.
No question today with this very long recap of mine. OPEN THREAD!!!
Latest Updates on Regional Meet-Up News Can Be Found Below the Orange Group Hug.
Let's Build Communities!
Our team is here to provide support and guidance to new and existing volunteer leaders of each regional and state group, helping them with recruiting, organizing and executing social and action events.
We invite you to join in this effort to build our community. There are many ways to pitch in.
If there isn't a group to join near you, please start one.
Instructions on HOW TO FORM A NEW DAILY KOS GROUP
List of All Existing Meatspace Groups
Where the Kogs Are: Index/Directory of the 130+ Localized Daily Kos Groups
THINK GLOBALLY, ACT LOCALLY
Colorado: Wednesdays, 6:00 PM Mountain
Michigan: Wednesdays, 6:00 PM Eastern
North Carolina: Sundays, 1:00 PM Eastern
Washington: Sundays, 3:30 PM Pacific
Event Organizers! Please contact wink from Netrootsradio.com by KosMail to schedule airtime with them to live broadcast the date of your Event. Wink & Justice will then promote it on The After Show radio program!
Sunday, August 9th
Butte County Kossacks of CA-01 Meet-up
TIME: 1:00 PM
LOCATION: Broadway Heights Restaurant
300 Broadway St. (Upstairs) • Chico
ORGANIZER: Send smileycreek a kosmail to attend
RSVPs:
1. smileycreek
2. Paradise50
3. SoCalHobbit
4. Caddis Fly (most likely)
5. side pocket
6. Besame (maybe)
7. Chico David RN (probable)
8. Sue
9. Jan Britton
10. FoundingFatherDAR
Plus: 11 more RSVP's from the Daily Kos Mailing List!
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Maybees: |
Latest diary: Chico & Paradise Meet-up: Sunday, August 9th, 1:00 PM
Thursday, August 13th
Virginia Kos Meet-up & No-Host Dinner
TIME: 6:30 PM
LOCATION: Silver Diner
11951 Killingsworth Ave • Reston
ORGANIZER: Send navajo a kosmail to reserve, seating limited
RSVPs:
1. navajo
2. JamieG in Md
3. Di from Nova
4. NinthElegy
5.
6.
7.
8.
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Saturday, August 15th
DC Kossacks Happy Hour courtesy of Daily Kos
TIME: 6:00 PM
LOCATION: Sky Bar, top of the Beacon Hotel
1615 Rhode Island Ave. NW • DC
ORGANIZER: Send navajo a kosmail to attend
RSVPs:
1. navajo
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
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Announcing Asheville, North Carolina as the location
for our next Regional Event! 9.26.15
Asheville, N.C. is the destination for September 26, 2015! DKos Asheville, the In-Real-Life group under the leadership of randallt, has been setting the example for other IRL groups across the nation regarding registering people to vote, getting out the vote, having a state open thread and setting up strategy conferences for their region. Because of this impressive leadership we've asked randallt to be the State Leader for all of North Carolina. We've got important work to do on the ground there and randallt has shown he's the person to make that happen.
All states are welcome to attend this event and if you do you can expect to meet Markos Moulitsas in person, as well as some of the Daily Kos staff. More details regarding this regional event will be shared in the future so please stay tuned to Connect! Unite! Act!
For now, SAVE THE DATE and spread the word!
by AndyT ♥ for Dallas Kossacks
AndyT had his largest event ever, 28 people in Dallas! Here's one photo:
Please visit AndyT's diary for many MORE photos! Enjoy! You can still REC it. You can join Dallas Kossacks by sending a Kosmail to AndyT.
by ZenTrainer ♥ for Nashville KosKats
Clockwise from bottom right: Anonymous L, Anonymous M,
Patrick is Lucky, Zen Trainer's water, Jon Sitzman, Al Fondy
You can join Nashville KosKats by sending a Kosmail to ZenTrainer.
by GreyHawk ♥ for Boston Kossacks
Mad Mary, CwV, a snapshot via his blog of gmoke, GreyHawk, HawkWife, Knockbally
You can join Boston Kossacks by sending a Kosmail to GreyHawk.
by Sara R ♥ for Koscadia
L-R: ozsea1, also mom of 5 (hiding), winglion, Faye, pdxteacher, quill, Sara R & AK Bear
You can join Koscadia by sending a Kosmail to Sara R.
navajo maintains the above event list. Kosmail her if you have any diaries
about your event or if you have changes or additions.
EVERYONE is welcome, tell us what you're working on,
share your show and tell, vent, whatever you want.
This is an open thread. Nothing is off topic.