I posted this as a comment in the Part II thread about the fundraising push, but then right afterwards, the "Last Push" thread went up and I'm not sure that many people will read Part II any more... SO, I thought I'd try my hand at my first-ever diary in an attempt to spread the word about this fundraising effort...
Follow me below for the text of an open letter I sent to my friends and family (and everybody else I could think of..)
Sorry to send this out to so many of you, and doubly-sorry if I guessed your political persuasions incorrectly... but TODAY -- RIGHT NOW -- is the last day when contributions can help candidates buy airtime. So, there's a big push going on throughout the netroots to help give candidates the money they need to combat the negative ads the republican'ts are going to start running next week. They've dumped hundreds of thousands into key districts -- but we can help.
The easiest way to give is through ActBlue. Members of DailyKos and MyDD are trying to reach a new milestone -- a total of 1.5 MILLION given through individual contributors to key races with strong netroots support.
We started the morning with a challenge to raise $100,000 in a single day -- but we blew that away by lunchtime (see http://www.dailykos.com/...). Many were people giving on top of what they've already given, but many were first-time givers. Personally, Virginia and I hit the well yet again, and again, and, for good measure, again - on top of the other contributions we've made this cycle. It felt great to be part of something this big, and to work with literally thousands of others to try to change the course of this election and save our country.
In fact, the push was so successful that many called for the challenge to be extended -- to bring the total given through the NetRoots page throughout the entire cycle to $1.5M -- and we're getting there. There's still a long way to go, but fundraising today alone is setting records for individual participation.Here's the link for the new challenge: http://www.dailykos.com/.... As it stands at this minute, we're at 13,704 contributiosn and $1,443,150.03 donated to 20 key races this cycle.
And, when you contribute, be sure to post about it a dKos in the thread shown immediately above. It's so much fun - every time somebody new contributes, they get messages of congratulations and thanks from other democrats looking to make a difference.
Now, you don't have to give much -- as much as you're comfortable with (or maybe even a bit more ;-). You'll see people giving $5, $10, $20 per candidate, and, of course, up and up. (And, if you're a dKos member, you know to add the $.01 to whatever amount you're giving to "tag" your contribution as one of ours ;-). EVERY little bit counts, and every bit helps. Remember, there are literally hundreds of thousands of people across the country doing this.
For example, in a 2-hour period earlier today, there were 501 new contributions to this site alone, for a total of more than $70,000 -- or 3.8 new contributors and $525 per minute! In fact, at some times during the day, the rate was even higher than that. It's amazing what we can do when working together.
Please take a look and think about whether you can/want to participate. Now's the time, and it can truly make a difference. To just cut right to the netroots actblue page, click here.
Perhaps you live in a place where one of the key races is being targeted. Perhaps not...but if you've been following the news, you'll recognize many of these races and you'll see that these are people who have a serious chance of helping the democrats take back the Senate. If you're not sure whom to contribute to, you can also have ActBlue distribute your donation across all the races this page is targeting. Of course, there are plenty of other races that are very important (e.g., McCaskill, Wetterling, and many others) and you can donate to them through other ActBlue pages... Races that I'm particularly interested in: Patrick Murphy in PA-08 -- he's trailing in the polls right now, but we can change that... Of course Webb (we've got to get rid of Felix "Macaca" Allen), Lamont (who is trailing Lieberman big-time right now, even though Lieberman lost the primary to him, so he abandoned the democratic party for the Lieberman party), as well as Tester and Sestak.
SO, again, if this email is unwelcome, just delete it and accept my apologies. Otherwise, please consider helping the NetRoots demonstrate our power and meeting this challenge.
THANKS to all of you... AND, please feel free to forward this email on to anybody you can think of.
GO BLUE!