New Info about Organizing for America and its Plans

and grateful that you are providing some sanity here at the field.  Some of us have not stopped organizing since the election.  We continue to meet, recruit, take action, and plan next steps.

I'm thrilled about the new website and especially the new voter file.  The campaign asked many of us to evaluate our experiences with the VAN and with our staff support.  It sounds like they are incorporating our feedback which says great things for the health of this organization.

Would you like us to report back on our house parties next week either here or at fieldhands?  I know that I would enjoy hearing what this group is doing.

Thanks again, Al.

I can't wait to listen to what a lot of the core organizers and supporters in Denver have to say and what their views are on the bill. It will be my first such meeting.

The fact is, thanks to horrid legislation called the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR), Colorado will be an even greater disaster without that federal money. We desperately need it. On top of there being no jobs, we're already the one of the lowest recipients of food stamps despite a massive need, food banks are empty here and there's absolutely no state money for anything.

Of course, those whining on the blogs about Obama also aren't the ones that stand to be hurt the most if the stimulus doesn't pass. But make no mistake, those who it will affect are the ones that are going to be out there organizing for their own self-interest, and in my eyes, there's nothing wrong with that!

Kos whines today in his "midday open thread"

Question for the Obama camp: If you have a 10 million-strong email list, why not, you know, use it?

Because if Bowers or Sirota ring the "Obama is failing" bell, you can always depend on Kos to salivate.

Is that for real? Did he bother to check his inbox?

Another blogger was complaining that Obama was not on TV selling the stimulus plan - even though he was on all the networks yesterday during prime time doing just that (as the linked video above shows).

It would be nice if "progressive" bloggers could at least be reality-based.

The media jackasses, and some of the clueless bloggers will keep spouting their idiocy , mean while, they will ignore the earth shifting under their feet...just like they did the election season.

I really believe that there are people who are simply unfulfilled if they can't criticize, and are willing to ignore reality if that's what is required.  Someone else here once speculated that it's pathological, and I tend to agree.

Meanwhile, Al: please cross-post at Kos.  There are multiple threads there issuing the same kinds of complaints about inaction, and they need some perspective (of course, if they're pathological complainers, I guess it won't really matter :)).

of you all having the chance to be involved in something like this. I wish I was American and there in the US and able to take part.

I've looked around over here to see if there's something I can get involved in and whilst there's nothing at the moment I'm going to keep looking - things are very different over here and so finding something is not as easy sadly, but I'll persevere!

...at about 5 p.m. ET (an hour from now). Check in then to help that along.

Hi Al,

I was one of the TL on yesterday's call.  I am hosting an event in my community on Saturday.  So far, I have 45 people who are committed to attending the event.  Our goal is going to be to create a grassroots primer (training module) that folks can take back to their workplaces and families to explain what is happening in terms of the economic dislocation that is taking place.   I will be using the discussion about the Recovery act to engage the group and solicit volunteers who will create the grassroots economic primer.

I have been a community organizer since I was a teenager.  The hard and lonely work of reaching out to people one person at a time is INTEGRAL to movement-building.

What I know for sure is that two years from now?  There will be another raft of news reports asking: "WTF?"  It never fails.  So please keep fighting the good fight....  I appreciate reading your thoughts.

Allan, I was just about to post that. Someone make a seat for Markos at the children's table....

Like Gemma, I'm at a loss to figure out what to do as an expat American here in Australia. I was so delighted that the Obama campaign brought us into the fold via Democrats Abroad - I phonebanked for GOTV for the first time since 1998 last year and felt grateful. I would love to get involved with OFA, but I haven't got the faintest idea how. Any ideas?

Incredulous. Who ARE these self selected "important" voices of the 'left' who are blogging with nothing to say!!!  It is such a joke!  You couldn't make up that kind of stupidity.

I am in AWE of the constant activity of this 15 day old Administration.  I can't count the number of emails I've gotten, and how many 'local' groups are also active.

The bloggers mentioned in the above comments are really distracted by not being as important as they wish they were. Who really cares what any of them have to say???  I'm expecially sad at what's happend to DKos.  Marcos seems so lost.  Well, he lost me when he went crazy about CK.

I go to DKos now only when Al is crossposting there.

I am in a similar situation, over in Germany. What is your country?

Gemma and Rachel - I noticed when researching the my.barackobama.com site that once you sign in there with a username and password and go to the "house meetings" link and click the option for "organize a house meeting," there is, for the first time, an option to pick a location outside of the United States. Since all the materials, including the video that will be shown at the meetings, will be downloadable from the website, I presume that Americans abroad can do get the materials and host these meetings, too.

Here.

I was on the SV list for that phone call and I thought, "No, not another conference call, not another house party."  I was so disappointed with the house party for the community service thing...only three of us came to the one our Fellow held.  I just hate the way everything is so rigidly structured.  That's just me, though.  I'm hyper-independent and what made working on the campaign so much fun was the early stuff where we got to make up the rules as we went along.  I felt more empowered then.  Later it was just "fall in line, do what you're told, rinse, repeat."  I must not be cut out for "compliance".

I'm dismayed, though about the new voter files.  I just did today complete another round of training on Vote Builder toward an eye on becoming a Regional Expert.  Am I wasting my time here?  This is very uncomfortable to me because I have an investment in training PCOs to use this voter file.  If the OFA is going to create another one, do I need training there, too? 

Color me frustrated.

Thought I'd share with you an email I received from a former FO and friend of mine who is organizing a house party for this weekend (and at which I'll be assisting).  For those of you who think OFA is only going to be about top-down direction, think again.  OFA will be driven by the grassroots not just the other way around.  Sometimes OFA will lead the horse and cart and sometimes individuals will USE the tools that OFA fosters/supplies to PUSH the damn cart faster themselves.  There will always be a tension between above and below, but I think it'll be a healthy tension united by common purpose throughout Obama's presidency:

Tuesday night I was on a conference call with Organizing For America, what the Obama campaign structure has morphed into since the campaign. I, along with thousands of other former Obama campaign volunteers, expected to get our marching orders, told who we should telephone, e-mail, visit, blog a bout - whatever it took to get the best possible stimulus legislation out of Congress. But that didn't happen. Instead, we heard about house parties for the weekend and future conference calls. Building blocks for the future - yes. But action for the here and now? No.

I'm done waiting.

We will be holding a house party to learn all we can about the Economic Stimulus Package, then we'll be phone banking, just like we did in the election, to the new battleground states. Our goal is simple: to create enough public pressure on on vulnerable Republican Senators by convincing their constituents to take action. We have to pass an effective stimulus bill, and not a Frankenstein's monster. It's being reported that the stimulus bill as is won't pass the Senate. That means the measures that will actually stimulate the economy will be gutted in favor of useless, but popular, tax cuts.

Bring your cell phone, your charger and your friends. We need to get moving. Refreshments will be served.

I'm beginning to realize that I'm going to need constant reminders that this is a long haul process. As bloggers and media ramp up the tension minute-by-minute, I start to get worried. Patience has never been a virtue of mine. But your posts help me remember that this kind of change is going to be a long hard slog (to borrow a phrase LOL).

"What does Obama want us to do?"

I'm sorry, I'm pretty sure Obama works for US, not the other way 'round. The progressive movement doesn't have to wait for his orders- it has to figure out what IT want and either 1) Make him do it or 2) Knock down the things in his way if he's already trying.

Don't get me wrong, it's fine for Obama to offer guidance and ask for our help, but why the hell did progressives WAIT for him to? They coulda moved on their own weaks ago.

What I've noticed is that a lot of people who worked with/for the Obama campaign during the election did so believing that the grassroots, community organizing style of Obama was merely a means to an end...the end being the White House.  I don't think it's fully sunk in that his goal wasn't to simply use that method to get to the bully pulpit, then wield the executive power the same way every President before him has done so.

That's not who President Obama is.  All these people who spent so much time deriding CNN and FOX news, complaining that they "didn't report what was really happening on the ground" during the election (and they weren't) now suddenly use CNN and FOX as a baseline for how Obama is fairing message-wise.  It's like spending a year building a boat of your own so you don't have to buy a ticket on the ferry, then complaining about the ticket prices.  It makes no sense.

I think one majorly overlooked aspect of this Presidency is how the "First 100 Days" theory is going to be blown out of the water.  Just like the campaign took several months to ramp up, as people got trained and organized...so too will it take a little time for OFA to get a grip and shape themselves to governance - though they seem well on their way with some of the info you posted here.  By the time that first 100 days is done, the "Obama campaign machine" will have morphed into the "Obama governing machine".  If people think he won't have the ability and support to get something done on day 212, they are going to be sorely mistaken.

I don't understand why others can't seem to understand these things.  I mean, I'm still REALLY new to all this stuff (first-time volunteer for Obama) and I still get it.

I wonder how much effort is going into supporting the stimulus package (the president's #1 legislative priority) vs supporting Howard Dean for HHS?

Not that I oppose the latter, I just think that the president and grassroots are out of sync at the moment.

Thanks for that info Al, I'll go investigate and look at that info about what expats can do and see if there's anything us international types can do (you see the biggest problem I have is that I'm not American). But I will investigate and see what information I can find, so thanks again!

@ Sophie 4:55 - Hi Sophie! I'm in the UK

Thanks for that, Al. Our house is a construction site right now, but I'll see if there are any house parties in the area.

I like your sentiment!  I had an idea today that might be totally off the wall, but what if folks took lists of the vulnerable Senators and their contact information to Employment offices and asked people waiting in line to make the calls?  Folks don't have to be constituents to say they'll be donating to the opponent of the Senator come 2010 if the job situation doesn't change.

That much of the internet blogs (including so called progressives), require controversy and anger to sustain reader hits. That must compel them to solicit and inflamme controversy and negative angst. I watched several popular blogs become advertisements for dissent for its own sake over the last year.. That said, the reality of that environment must become part of the Obama team's reality in dealing with promoting their agenda. There is no simple line to the goal anymore (if there indeed ever was). They must be extremely disciplined and relentless in pursuing the message and very crafty in applying their bi-paritsan approach (or even intra partisan approach) There is a mix of outreach and inflicted pain that must accompany their approach. Its going to have to become a velvet machine. Till O gets this up and running, we have to help him out. I'm all over it and hope you are too..

In addition to what you are doing here, thank you for calling out the hystertical children taking over DK (Open Left has always been that way). I just left a comment in another 'the sky has fallen' diary at DK that will probably not be well received. I don't know that place anymore. So, another thank you: for giving me a place with no drama.

You've convinced me that anything that helps people get together and feel involved in politics is good. But using myself as an example of a highly eroded idealist, the houseparties stike me as better places for good responsible Democrats who support Obama's positions than for me. Still I guess I'll try one on.

Washington will be better under Obama, but not changed enough.

Great advice, Al to one of the naysayers on the DKos thread:

"Again, you're being jerked around by the news cycle and that will forever keep you from being able to build something that lasts."

I think it also makes us anxious.  Thanks for the reminder.

I was thinking how much this reminds me of the campaign. The Chicken Littles and the Armchair Strategists cry out "Where are the surrogates? Why doesn't he hit back harder?". They do not seem to have learned anything from the success of Obama's campaign but continue making the same mistakes they did then.

Check it out:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/2/4/223213/5225/298/693306

I especially like this paragraph

There are TONS of people who work in communities and volunteer in politics who don't read blogs. Parts of Obama's base (esp. poor, urban folk) don't have internet. So many of the people who volunteered for Obama's camapign (Plouffe says more than half and I believe him on that one) had never volunteered for any campaign before. (Some of the campaign's staffers including some who were based in Chicago hadn't worked on any campaign before.) Many were not self-described liberals and don't subscribe to policies that are as progressive as yours. The netroots is not THE base; it's part of the base.

This is so true, the netroots are not the grassroots. I met and worked with plenty of folks who would not even have a clue who Markos is.

KD

Well, let's see:

-- He got the nation's governors (including Republican ones) to come out to DC last week to back the stimulus

-- He got the nation's mayors (including Republican ones) to come out to DC THIS week to back the stimulus

-- He's sent out copies of the stimulus proposal to reporters in every state, custom-tailored for each state

-- He's already activated his e-mail list, contrary to the accusations of some prominent lefty bloggers (many of whom never liked him much and have looked for pretexts to attack him, justified or not)

-- He's been on national TV repeatedly pushing the stimulus

-- He's even got an Op-Ed in today's WaPo

But yet there are still people out there whining that "he's not doing ANYTHING!"

Oh, well.

Thanks for the Kos link, Karen.  A great post, indeed!

Because of the Obama campaign, I learned about blogging. I lurked on the blog for months at the beginning of the campaign. I am pleased that Organizing for America has the blog I first connected with 2 years ago.   My netroots activity via the Obama campaign led me to The Field.  I am grateful to Barack for opening up the power of connection via the blog universe.  After all, that's how I found The Field!

The amount of grassroots training the campaign provided, has given me a great foundation to build on, now that the campaign is over. Many folks I worked with during the campaign did not blog, even on the Obama site.   

We will be attending an Econ. Meeting this weekend.

Grassroot +Netroot= Change we can acheive. 

Awesome list of links!

I remember at one point during the campaign, Al commented on bloggers who are like football fans thinking that the quarterback on the field threw a pass because they yelled something about it from the stands. Today we see some bloggers thinking that Obama listened to them and is "mounting a fightback" even though this is obviously a carefully orchestrated public relations campaign planned well in advance to coincide with the lead-up to the Senate vote.

I read that earlier and almost created an account there to comment, but don't have the time.

Actually, I really did not like that post.  Despite the hypocrisy between the title and content, the overwhelming theme was to make sure Howard Dean doesn't get too much credit.  There was even a cherry on top with the comment about Rahm Emmanuelle and Chuck Schumer being more responsible than Dean for the Dem gains in the 2006 midterms, without offering any evidence whatsoever besides a link to Mark Ambinder (please...what a joke).

What planet is this person living on?!?  Seriously.  Howie Klein at Down With Tyranny has spent a great deal of time showing how Rahm and friends very likely cost Dems several more victories in 2006, and how the actions of Dean-led DNC correlate directly to several of the surprise wins of '06 and '08.

Here are some simple facts:  Almost two years after Howard Dean takes over the DNC, Dems have one of the most successful midterms, if not THE most, in history after many election cycles of disaster for Dems, while led by Terry MacAuliffe and the other DLCers.  Two years after that, there's almost a repeat and at the same time we elect a melanin-enhanced community organizer as Prez in a blowout, and with an incredibly hostile BigMedia doing everything they can to stop it.  When Dean burst on the scene in '03, he championed a strong withdrawal from Iraq at a time when this wasn't very popular.  Dean's campaign demonstrated the potential of online fundraising and organizing that Obama took to a whole new level.  And on and on...

Can't really beat Dean's success rate as DNC Chair.  You know...results.

Of course things that Dean did are being improved now, and today's tactics will be altered in the future.  The point is that it took a trailblazer like Dean to stand up to the failed "leadership" that had dominated the Dem Party into near-extinction for the previous decades.  And further, Howard Dean could not be any more gracious right now.  That Dkos poster is so compelled to write multiple long posts devoted to knocking Howard Dean down a rung or two?!?  Of all the topics that we face today, that's what this person chooses to write about?!?  Perhaps that writer should pick up more hours at work.

In fact, now I'm realizing how much time I'm wasting even typing this out, but I do think historical record is very important for future action, and I'm tired of DLCers and their revisionist tendencies.

The Field and Klein's site are rapidly becoming the only two places I spend time with anymore.

Exactly.  It takes a lot of time and coordination to get the nation's governors and mayors -- Democrats AND Republicans -- to converge on Capitol Hill.  This was probably in the works well before the inauguration.

Booman makes the point here about what Bowers wants to know: "What amendments does he support and what amendments does he oppose? What is essential and what is negotiable? How are Obama's minions supposed to know what to advocate if they are not provided with better guidance?"

This is important. In the first place it prevents working at cross purposes. If Obama is saying "strip the transit budget for Republican votes" but there's a grassroots effort to create public pressure for transit expenditures then they cancel each other out. In that token how will we know what to say "I disagree on the importance of this item" if he doesn't tell us what he thinks is important in the thing.