Musings on Losing 1

ijk

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Wednesday November 03, 2010 · 10:27 PM PDT

2010/11/03 · 22:27

Always change a losing game.

Last night we spotted the other guys a bunch of points due to a bad economy, and another bunch of points on frakking up the health care strategy. Without those, this would probably have looked like a pretty ordinary midterm election.

But I’m worried about something else here - a structural deficit. I think we've worked our way into a setup where it's easy for Republicans to run successful campaigns, and very hard for us to. We’ve come a very long way in the last decade in recognizing the infrastructure the Republicans created and building one to match. Money, media, volunteers, blogs, recruiting good candidates, standing up for our beliefs - we’ve made huge progress. We could always do all of those better, of course.

It’s still true that if we do everything absolutely right, we win elections in America. That’s not really good enough. We’re going to make mistakes. We’re going to inherit economies crashed by the Republicans. We’re going to have candidates who are good people who would be good officeholders but for one reason or another are not the most electable candidates ever. We cannot accept a system in which we get crushed every time something goes wrong.

ijk

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Sunday October 31, 2010 · 2:46 PM PDT

2010/10/31 · 14:46

Complaints are sometimes a pretty good tell for what’s actually going on. A lot of self-proclaimed centrists don’t like Jon Stewart’s rally because it co-opts the center, laughs at Important Things, or isn’t liberal enough. It’s pretty tidy when your critics makes the point for you.

The actual center of American political opinion is a pretty good fit for Stewart’s political beliefs. It’s also a pretty good fit for the leftish side of the Democratic Party. A random American chosen off the street is likely to believe that we should do something serious about global warming, that abortion should be legal (though pretty regulated), that single-payer sounds like a pretty good idea, that it’s time to give up on Afghanistan, that it’s high time for gays in the military and civil unions, that the Bush tax cuts for the rich should go, and that you should be able to get pot with a prescription. The left doesn’t win either the public or Stewart on every issue, but it’s a win on almost all of the big ones. On most of them it’s not even very close.

ijk

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Wednesday May 05, 2010 · 1:29 AM PDT

2010/05/05 · 01:29

In an incredible unanimous vote, the Flagstaff, AZ City Council voted to sue the state of Arizona, seeking an injunction to block implementation of the awful new anti-immigrant bill.

For some background on what's been happening in Flagstaff, you can see my previous diaries. (Forgive me being short on links, it's been a very long day.)

Mayor Sara Presler (who really needs Kossack help to get re-elected in two weeks) and Councilwoman Coral Evans led the charge. A record-setting number of Flagstaff residents swarmed the Council hall and the lobby outside, offering comment after comment in support for over three hours. Other liberal and moderate members of the council eagerly joined in, and somehow we won over even the votes of the two conservatives, one of them an honest-to-god Republican.

ijk

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Sunday May 02, 2010 · 12:07 AM PDT

2010/05/02 · 00:07

Flagstaff had a terrific May Day rally today, with about five hundred people coming out. (That's like a hundred thousand people in New York.) A few of my photos are below. For background on the crucial immigration battle in Flagstaff, see my previous post. The full set of photos is here.

ijk

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Thursday April 29, 2010 · 2:52 PM PDT

2010/04/29 · 14:52

Tuesday night, the City Council of Flagstaff, Arizona agreed unanimously to have the city legal staff begin planning to seek an injunction against the new immigration bill. Mayor Sara Presler and Councilwoman Coral Evans led the council in what might be the most aggressive action by an AZ city government yet.

Next Tuesday the city attorney will present them some options for a final vote. We badly need your help to see this through.

[more after the break]

ijk

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Tuesday April 27, 2010 · 10:46 PM PDT

2010/04/27 · 22:46

A few days back we were brainstorming for ways to effectively protest the awful immigration bill here in Arizona.

We came up with the idea of wearing signs, t-shirts, and bumper stickers proclaiming, "I Am An Illegal Immigrant!" Along with showing solidarity, under the new law police should be obligated to question us about our status - making the ridiculousness of the law clear, and making it much harder to enforce. We're already seeing some success with this kind of strategy up here in Flagstaff, where our city council has voted unanimously to look into suing for an injunction against the bill taking effect.

We have an active facebook page, and stores where you can get bumper stickers and t-shirts at cost. Join the fun.

CQ Upgrades Arizona Races

ijk

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Thursday November 02, 2006 · 7:43 PM PST

2006/11/02 · 19:43

Congressional Quarterly just
moved my race in AZ-01, along with AZ-05, from 'Leans R' to 'No Clear Favorite'.

Here at the Ellen Simon campaign this is no great surprise; we've known we were this competitive with Renzi all along, and I'm sure Harry Mitchell feels the same way about Hayworth. But it's always nice to have a little confirmation.

As always, read my other diaries on the race for more.

AZ-01: Let's talk about Ellen

ijk

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Tuesday October 24, 2006 · 8:55 PM PDT

2006/10/24 · 20:55

You probably all know there's been a bit of news about Renzi's corruption lately. I'll leave the many able folk at dailykos to dissect the details as they develop. I want to tell you a bit about Ellen.

Back in May, I was looking around for a campaign to join. A dear friend of mine, the Democratic Party chair of one of the counties in the district, told me I had to talk to this new woman who was running. I did, and never looked back. Why, is after the break...
Read More

AZ-01 photodiary: What Ellen Simon is fighting for

ijk

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Monday October 23, 2006 · 7:35 PM PDT

2006/10/23 · 19:35

I thought I'd take a break from talking about polls and issues and campaigning, and try and convey in pictures some of what I feel the Ellen Simon-Rick Renzi race is about.

I won't start a fight over who has the most beautiful Congressional district in the nation, but I'm sure the vast and varied country of the AZ-01 is on anyone's top ten. I've gotten to see a lot of it during this campaign, and while I can't say I love the frequent four-hour drives, I'm constantly amazed by my surroundings.

Big image warning: about 6 MB of photos after the break. Read More

18 Hours in the Life of a Campaign Staffer

ijk

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Sunday October 15, 2006 · 2:56 PM PDT

2006/10/15 · 14:56

I'm staff on the Ellen Simon for Congress (AZ-01) campaign. The last couple of days have been especially crazy, so I thought to give those of you who aren't able to take this kind of job a bit of a peek at what it's like, I'd post a diary of them. I work in a field office in Flagstaff, about 50 miles from the campaign headquarters in Sedona; most of my job is recruiting volunteers and running phone banks and the like, although I'm also the campaign's data geek and sometimes get pulled to do research.

Friday, 9:00 AM (continued after the break...) Read More

AZ-01 race - shiny new poll

ijk

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Friday October 13, 2006 · 10:09 AM PDT

2006/10/13 · 10:09

You've probably all seen the Majority Watch poll by now. I'm a staffer for the Ellen Simon campaign here in the AZ 1st in northern Arizona (and longtime Kossack), and we're all bouncing off the walls at our results - we're up 50-46%!

We've known all along that despite facing a two-term Bush Republican who likes to campaign dirty (Rick Renzi) we were in a very competitive fight. We got into the race relatively late, and no one thought we could counter Renzi's corrupt cash machine; as a result, we've been slow to attract attention from either the DNC/DCCC or the netroots. It's been lonely work, driving across the desert in the largest congressional district that isn't an entire state.

Now we can finally prove it's paid off. More after the break... Read More

Schweitzer - a Class Act

ijk

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Thursday May 04, 2006 · 7:10 AM PDT

2006/05/04 · 07:10

In Montana yesterday, Brian Schweitzer demonstrated once again that, contrary to conventional wisdom, he wasn't elected just by being pro-hunting and guns.

Late in World War I, anti-German sentiment ran particularly high in Montana, which had a large German-American population. The state legislature made it illegal to speak German, banned all books in the language, and passed an anti-sedition law that essentially made criticism of the government illegal. Seventy-nine people were convicted under the law.

Yesterday, Gov. Schweitzer pardoned them all.

(there's more!) Read More

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Musings on Losing 1

On Rallies, Sanities, and the Center

Flagstaff sues to stop SB1070

Photo Diary: Flagstaff, AZ Immigration Protest

Help AZ Mayor fighting immigration bill!

AZ Bill: Street theater protest

CQ Upgrades Arizona Races

AZ-01: Let's talk about Ellen

AZ-01 photodiary: What Ellen Simon is fighting for

18 Hours in the Life of a Campaign Staffer

AZ-01 race - shiny new poll

Schweitzer - a Class Act