Title updated to reflect main diary content
Not everybody gets to shake hands with Russ Feingold on their birthday, but I was given that treat tonight. I told him that it was an honor to shake his hand and I tried to thank him for protecting our civil liberties, but it was a busy room and I hope he heard. He asked about how long I'd lived in Wisconsin and where I was from, before he lost his voice and someone handed him a bottle of water.
Then I said that I enjoyed reading his posts on DailyKos and he thanked me for letting him know that in particular.
All this occured at an event for our local candidate for Wisconsin Senate (District 31), Kathleen Vinehout.
But that was not the end of my "political" birthday....
A few days ago I posted
a diary asking for advice on what to do about a local forum planned by American Association of University Women and three other non-partisan women's groups. We'd been planning the forum for three months and last Friday, three days before the event, we received word from the Republican incumbents that they were pulling out. Their charge? Bias. Because one of AAUW's members had donated money to a local Democratic candidate, they were pulling out. The objection was a surprise, given that the candidates had participated in the local Chamber of Commerce's forum, despite numerous campaign contributions from its Board members.
I posted my request for advice here and got great tips, which I copied down and took to our emergency meeting. We then drafted a response to the pull-out letter, which we sent to the candidates and the members of the media that they had contacted with their letter. The goal of the organizations involved is truly nonpartisan, so we opted to take the high road. I am including our letter below.
We did go ahead with the forum, and left the empty chairs at the tables, which had been set up in advance, anyway. We got a very good turnout, and before the event the dispute over bias had hit the front page of our local paper, as well as two of the local tv news stations. I believe the event itself made the 10 o'clock news here.
As for the Republicans -- evidently they had set up a listening session with the College Republicans to coincide with the forum -- organized and arranged after they had agreed to participate in our event.
The sad thing is we really did want to have an informative event for community voters. But given that they pulled out on us after months of planning and dollars that our organizations do not have to spare, I hope the door hits them in the ass on their way out.
Response letter
Senator Ron Brown
31st Senate District
Senator David Zien
23rd Senate District
Representative Rob Kreibich
93rd Assembly District
Representative Terry Moulton
68th Assembly District
October 22, 2006
Dear Senators and Representatives:
The Candidate Forum for Chippewa Valley Voters will take place Monday, October 23, 2006, despite the last minute notification that you will not be attending. It is our hope you will reconsider and participate.
Why go ahead?
We are still committed to our goal of providing Chippewa Valley voters the opportunity to get to know their candidates. As we stated in our letter of August 28th, our forum will focus on issues important to women, such as education and the environment. The specific topics were mailed to you on October 3rd: women's healthcare, solid waste disposal, educational funding, W-2, and political gridlock. We also detailed the forum format and ground rules.
We were disappointed to receive your letter on Friday, October 20th. We have been coordinating and publicizing this event for over three months. The four organizations involved have carefully formulated questions that reflect each of their non-partisan missions. The League of Women Voters and the American Association of University Women both have long traditions of facilitating non-partisan forums.
It surprised us that you have questioned our forum's impartiality. This issue was not raised by any of the candidates who participated in the Chamber of Commerce's forum in early October, despite partisan contributions by the Chamber's Board of Directors.
We hope that you will join us tomorrow evening at South Middle School. We plan to conduct an informative and nonpartisan event.