On Monday, navajo introduced me as the new Daily Kos Statewide Organizer for Michigan. My objective is to help us create a GOTV infrastructure so we can #FliptheHouse in Michigan in 2016. How's that for ambitious?
There are 110 seats in the Michigan House of Representatives. Democrats now hold 47; we need 56 for a majority. In 2014, we lost six MI house seats by fewer than 1,000 votes each. With stronger campaigns and a better ground game, we can capture those six plus the three we need for a majority.
You know we can do it. Michigan is fundamentally a blue state, fittingly enough given all our fresh water ;) With careful strategy and determination we can reclaim the legislature, the statewide executive offices, and dare I say it, even the judiciary. In 2016, we may even have good prospects for increasing our proportion of Democrats in the U.S. House as well, if not taking back the majority.
But we need to think long-term to do all of that. We didn't get to be in such a deep hole overnight, and it will take us some time to climb out of it. If the political upheaval of the past couple of decades has demonstrated anything, it has shown that we (the 99% at least) are all in this together. What affects people in one Michigan city, county, or area has an impact on all of us in the state, just as discrimination in one state has a negative effect on the country as a whole. Changing this for the better is a true grass-roots effort, starting with all of us here.
How Are We Going to Proceed?
Meteor Blades has long promoted the goal of having not only a 50-state strategy, but a 176,000-precinct strategy. Here's some of his reasoning from a diary he posted in March of this year, "Year-round, locally based precinct organizing is essential for moving the Democratic Party leftward":
But year-round, locally based organizing in each of the nation's 176,000 precincts is a crucial element for the future success of the Democratic Party. Not the party as we now know it, but one that is more progressive and more willing than it has been to fight vigorously for the economic, social, and environmental interests of the working classes that make up the vast majority of Americans. We can't wait for the party to make needed changes from the top. We've already seen what it has done with the 50-state strategy. We have to make changes from the bottom.
Alone, this locally based precinct organizing won’t do the job. But without it we’ll remain hamstrung. By locally based, I mean face-to-face, door-to-door, shoestring-funded, volunteer-driven, local organizing in every voting precinct in the nation by people who actually live in or close by those precincts. People who know the neighborhood because it’s home. I want us to leverage this local organizing into a simple goal: closing the gap between how many Democrats vote in midterm and presidential elections by 10 percent in 2018 and 50 percent in 2022.
I'm taking part in this exact effort in my home county, Washtenaw, as co-chair of the Precinct Organizing Committee (POC) for the county Democratic Party. We're building on the leadership of our predecessors as co-chairs, Chris Savage and Tad Wysor, along with the work that party activists in the POC have contributed in the last several election cycles.
We have maps to plot the location of our active precinct delegates and leaders; we have canvassing trainings in the works, so that we can expand the number of activists who are ready to start knocking on doors and registering voters this fall; we have plans to target key open precincts in our county to boost our presence at the polls and in elected offices.
In places where the MDP doesn't have people on the ground, we can be those people. In places where the MDP is strong, we can solidify our approach and then reach out to our neighbors.
I know that there are Kossacks throughout this wonderful but beleaguered state of ours who are eager to push back against the regressive policies of our governor and legislature. Some of you, like me, are already well-ensconced within the leadership of your county party, and happy to be there. Others might be productively involved in your Congressional District organization, or in one or more of the MDP Caucuses. If so, that's great: we can learn and benefit from your experience and connections while making the overall coverage more complete and effective.
But no doubt there are others who wish that there were an effective county party in place in your part of the state. That's one way we can help right away--by bringing like-minded folks together, and providing encouragement to each other to get out and talk to our neighbors.
One Important Tool: Meetups
Over the past couple of years, we've had meetups on a semi-regular basis in Metro Detroit, for the Motor City Kossacks. While we haven't turned these meetups into strategy sessions--yet--they have helped us get to know each other. They've also provided a way for us to share our own experiences with political activism, positive and negative, and offered encouragement for us to persevere.
We will be increasing our meetup activity throughout the metro Detroit area between now and the 2016 election season. I'm hoping to create a regular rotation, with a calendar of meetups. (And of course, yes, I'm looking for help in this regard!)
But this summer and fall, before the weather gets too intimidating for long drives, I'm hoping to have several other meetups throughout the Lower Peninsula. These dates and approximate locations are now under discussion:
Aug. 8th and 9th--One or two meetups, in Kalamazoo, Kent and/or Muskegon Counties.
Aug. 15th--Meetup in Benzie County
If you're interested in attending one (or more!) of these meetups, please send me a Kosmail OR reach out via email. My contact email for the site is peregrinekate AT gmail DOT com as listed in my DKos profile.
If you're interested in HELPING TO ORGANIZE such a meetup, I'd especially love to hear from you--even if your area is not close to the Lake MI side of the state. We can do this! if we work together.
I look forward to hearing from all Michigan Kossacks. Together, let's turn MI blue again.