This was originally a comment to Kos's diary, in which he mentions donating to other candidates instead of Obama today, due to the smashing success of Operation Piss Off the People Supporting and Bankrolling His Campaign In Order To Prove He Hates the Dirty Fucking Hippies, but it kind of inflated.
I made a similar decision to Kos's today. I threw $10 to each of Obama and two other Orange to Blue-ers, but I gave a larger donation - it wasn't much, $50, but it was all that was left in my budget this round and I'd been aiming it at Obama - to another amazing Illinois Democrat, Bill Foster. Maybe some of you can do a little better than I could.
No sour grapes here. I'm still volunteering for Obama's campaign, I'm still supporting the campaign. I'm still going to run myself ragged making sure we carry Pennsylvania. I signed up for a democracy bond when Granny Doc whipped us into shape. I'm proud of all of this, and I'm proud of Obama, even if I've been more than a bit vexed by him lately.
This is about limited resources, and what we do with them. And while people are looking at last minute donations, if you've given to Orange to Blue and you're looking to send a message with your limited resources that your views should actually be taken into account, how about the incredible, Hastert's seat winning, ethics reform tiebreaking, boldly FISA fighting Bill Foster. There hasn't been much attention to this seat since he won it and dramatically salvaged ethics legislation (on day one!!!), but he's fighting his previous challenger Jim Oberweis again, and he needs all the help I can get.
This is the real reason for this diary: I responded to the autoemail thanking for me for my contribution.
In the off chance that someone actually reads these emails, you're welcome! As a former Chicagoan (currently Pennsylvanian) I was excited to help Foster by giving a small donation in the runoff election, and while there were a lot of causes and candidates that I could have contributed my limited resources to today, I wanted to send the message that I donated the bulk of my end-of June donations as a result of Foster standing up and being one of the few Democrats in close districts to vote against the embarassing FISA bill that passed the House of Representatives. Bill Foster's leadership on this gives me hope for a broken Congress.
I heard back, which made me even happier I'd thrown in what I could, and sad I couldn't give a good bit more (I removed the contact information for the campaign worker as I didn't ask for permission to post this...):
As a former Pennsylvanian now living in Chicagoland, I’m glad to hear that good policy really is good politics. Thanks again for your contribution.
Indeed.