Denver Debrief

[jhaygood]

Hey All - So now that the dust has settled, what are your thoughts about your participation at the convention? Was it interesting? Worth attending? Was it primarily personal satisfaction or did you feel it added to the campaign effort? Just interested in a debrief from those that were there, and if it re-focused your efforts in any ways.

[Janey Laird]

What a good question.

I am very glad I went and worth every effort. In my case, native Denverites made it easy for me as they supplied important things like sleeping couches and laptops and good restaurant suggestions.

I went for personal satisfaction. I was able to breakfast with the Utah delegation and learned a bit about what the state party wants to try and accomplish in Utah. There isn't anything that can be done to win the election for Obama, but party building can go on and it would seem this type of convention is ideal for that. We are not a swing state so anything that paints the New Democrat to moderates in a positive way is good.

In our area, focusing on voter registration for young people and encouraging the always large influx of out-of-staters moving here is one way to make Utah more of a swing state. This seems similar to Colorado but a decade or so behind I would guess. The convention was very good for that. The Utah party does seem to want to find ways to highlight the positives to keep growing its membership.

What does everyone else think?

[Tonya Hennessey]

Echoing Janey, good questions.

Attending the Big Tent and other side events at the convention were definitely worthwhile as a part of engaging as a citizen in the political process, without being credentialed for the convention itself. Getting to go to Obama's speech at Mile High unexpectedly was of course a huge bonus. Now that I know what a convention scene is like, I'd take the opportunity again in future.

My own reasons for going were multi-fold:
* The personal satisfaction of engaging in the process.
* To network both personally and professionally.
* To learn more about the blogosphere and other new media, also in the sense of "job training" for my non-profit, or NGO, work.
* Candidly speaking, more "job training" in the sense of engaging (although not as substantively as I hope to in future) in Field Hands blogging updates, as well as doing several informal video and radio interviews on issues, including 1 live over-the-phone radio interview from Rice Park at the RNC. It was great to do this without the pressure of having to identify as CorpWatch, as I move into new work roles (historically I'm a fundraiser).

Did this help the campaign?
It helped the campaign in the sense of getting one more citizen involved, having one more citizen experience the energy in the air all around Denver, one more citizen who was both in Denver and St. Paul and could experience first-hand the difference (though admittedly I stayed well away from the cops this time round, not in a position to be arrested at present). But the energy was very different. So much more festive in Denver, alive and buzzing. St. Paul was much more somber, the police presence was everywhere, and the convention there to be fair was also thrown into disarray by the threat of Hurricane Gustav.

It also helped the campaign in building capacity skills for one more person to participate more and more actively and effectively in the political process. That means in the lead up to this election, and then beyond. Equally, as I split the trip between work and personal time, again I gained experience and contacts that will also help me be more effective over time in the NGO world.

Did the experience re-focus my efforts in any ways?
I'll go for it here and give a bit of a personal answer. I am still coming back in a number of ways from a serious illness a few years back, that was a devastating experience. So, attending the convention and being part of the Denver Posse also gave me space and opportunity to get out there again in some ways apart from the broader international NGO/policy movements in which I've been entwined for so many years. I could experiment a bit, write on these pages, do the informal interviews, get to know more of the blogging environment without being in the streets protesting at this time.

I could jump in with a new group of people and learn a bit about them and the different talents and personalities just being myself, not being attached to Greenpeace International or other NGOs or institutions. Mind you, a few of my NGO friends were at the Big Tent, and I was happy to see them. But I could also get out from certain shadows, and observe, and do my thing without the pressure.

So this was personally refreshing, energizing, fun and re-focusing!

I don't feel I accomplished all I could have, politically-speaking, but the point is, the experience was also just another beginning of sorts, with a long road yet to go.

Thanks for asking.

- Tonya

[jhaygood]

That's great Tonya - thanks. This is new for me, in the sense that I'd followed politics forever, but had never been involved. It had been easy for me to feel that my efforts wouldn't matter on the massive national scale. But what I've found in this campaign is that it really requires each of those small contributions, and in fact those small initial efforts are what get the ball rolling, leading to what we have now, which is a massive coalition of experienced volunteers and newcomers like myself.

It's terrific to see, and while I hope and pray we win this election, I look forward to this new organization hanging together after the election to continue to press for what we feel is right, no matter the outcome. I hope that this vast community of concerned liberals can stay unified and connected to keep people on track in Washington. It's such a powerful thing, I hope it hangs together...

[Tonya Hennessey]

That's a really good lesson to pull out of getting involved: be it a political campaign, an environmental or other pressure campaign, overall success takes a whole lot of efforts across the spectrum. I'm getting directly involved on the political side this election, as there is finally a candidate I am re-inspired by (though, Obama has no magic wand, either) and because things in the U.S. are becoming so dire on so many fronts, and the alternative is CLEAR.

McCain/Palin can put forth their maverick reformer change message all they want, but their records are clear, and the people populating their campaign are the Bush/Cheney people.

At the same time, it's going to take that ongoing engagement after the elections to keep the pressure up for progressive outcomes -- which is one reason I decided to check out Field Hands for political discussion and organizing more deeply than the Obama site, DFA, etc. I'm counting on us to keep together November and beyond....

Right now I'm on a DFA training call/webinar for campaign phonebanking and canvassing (also good refresher for prepping and making calls to individual donors to your organization, and canvassing tactics of course translate across issues). I think that these kinds of efforts, while they may seem small, are going to be so important in this end run to the election.

There's a lot of money out there in the ether, so much teevee --- human contact is one of the key things a person can do to reach enough people to ensure we win this one! I've found it super useful so far, would recommend these training calls. Caveat that I started out canvassing in the early 1990s---I worked with some really good canvassers, and what I'm hearing on this call jibes very much w/past experience in successful settings. And now, technology is allowing for free trainings and organizing on a much larger scale!!! We are lucky for these new ways to connect!!!

- Tonya

jhaygood said:

That's great Tonya - thanks. This is new for me, in the sense that I'd followed politics forever, but had never been involved. It had been easy for me to feel that my efforts wouldn't matter on the massive national scale. But what I've found in this campaign is that it really requires each of those small contributions, and in fact those small initial efforts are what get the ball rolling, leading to what we have now, which is a massive coalition of experienced volunteers and newcomers like myself.
It's terrific to see, and while I hope and pray we win this election, I look forward to this new organization hanging together after the election to continue to press for what we feel is right, no matter the outcome. I hope that this vast community of concerned liberals can stay unified and connected to keep people on track in Washington. It's such a powerful thing, I hope it hangs together...