Toolbox: Successful Issue Candidacy

We will win in November, when we have strong leaders, who lead the polls not follow the polls, who courageously stand for principles not double talk a flexible position, who can be clearly identified by all as being noble, good and true instead of the corrupt incompetence that is now our country's leadership. When we have a very good candidate who we feel should have a leadership position on an issue, we nominate a ordinary person from the floor of the convention, to speak for this issue. This is a tool for bringing backbone and courage into our democratic party. We have a wonderful example where Charlie Underwood spoke at Democratic Farm Labor (DFL) party convention in Minnesota for peace. He spoke eloquently from the heart. If you click on "Senate candidate Charlie Underwood at the DFL state convention" at this link, you can hear the speech: http://minnesota.publicradio.org/... It is truly a speech from the heart, speaking the truth to power. At the same link, is a summary of the convention and a recording of the question and answer period.

In addition to Charlie's speech, there was a coordinated "Peace First" http://www.peaceintheprecincts.org/ campaign for "no endorsement" to send a peace message by votes to the endorsed candidate. The information on this website made it possible to run a grassroots no budget campaign. With just 12 people starting this campaign and no money, we received 20% of the convention vote for "no endorsement". Most of us will go on to work very hard for our endorsed candidate, yet we still hope for a leader who will lead on peace. We believe the voters this November will be looking for strong courageous leadership!