Using the information gathered from this site, I've spent the past two days doing the things that many of you are probably doing too. I voted (using the California absentee ballot); I used Moveon.org's list to call Democratic office holders to encourage them to "Use it or Lose it" following up on Chris Bowers's great idea of taking idle money from sure-bet election campaigns and diverting it to needy Democratic candidates around the country; and I've phone banked from home on behalf of Debra Bowen, who's running for California Secretary of State. Finally, I donated $100 to Debra's campaign. We here in California can't afford to let the all important office of Secretary of State stay in the hands of the GOP, knowing what we know about how they conduct voter suppression and vote tampering.
The phone banking from home has been very good. The people who've picked up the phone and talked with me have all been polite. Some know about Debra, others needed some info. I left a ton of messages and I also got a lot of disconnected numbers. In the midst of my efforts my own phone rang and it was a volunteer from the Angelides campaign looking for my vote. It's fantastic to see how active the Democrats are here in California. Even though Arnie's run a smart campaign for the most part and Phil hasn't been very visible at all, the Dems are doing everything they can to get out the vote. That's what it's all about, right?
As for talking with the various campaign offices around the country using the Moveon list, I actually got a chance to talk to some of the staffers, one in particular from John Olver's office in Massachusetts. Apparently I wasn't the first one using the Moveon list to call the office. They're getting swamped! The staffer was very talkative and said he didn't think it was fair of Moveon to call his boss's behavior outrageous, considering Martin Meehan, also from Mass, who's sitting on his coffers because he's thinking of a future run for Senator. Olver, the staffer said, had already made contributions of 250k, 86k and 32k to the DCCC and other singled out races around the country. Good on him! Allen Boyd of Florida and Steny Hoyer also had staffers who spoke of their bosses largesse toward other Democratic candidates this cycle.
The passion is there! I hope it translates into Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress. All those of you who haven't donated time or money to campaigns, please consider doing it. You'll feed the enthusiasm that's building everywhere and you'll feel better for having made an effort on behalf of your beliefs.