As Ben Smith notes, Obama supporters in New York are starting to flex their political might and demonstrating the organizing skills they learned during the campaign.
Manhattan Young Dems, a local group infiltrated by Obama volunteers and staff after the election, has taken on the cause of marriage equality in New York in a BIG way. Seeing the need for online organizing and knowing how to meet it, this saavy group launched newyorkequality.com, a website that makes it easy for New Yorkers to contact their state senators and encourage them to support the marriage equality bill now before them.
The site went live yesterday, and in the first several hours received over 20,000 visitors, in part due to a plug on Perez Hilton.
This very powerful tool has the potential to have a real impact on this issue in NY and can serve as a model for future campaigns.
From the MYD press release:
"Newyorkequality.com is making it easy for New Yorkers to get involved and to have their Senators take seriously their views on the importance of marriage equality," said Al Benninghoff, MYD President. "Our strategy is to inundate the Senators who oppose the bill, regardless of what party they represent, with messages from their own constituents asking them to change their opinions."
Newyorkequality.com has a powerful assortment of online organizing tools that allow individuals to send targeted emails and handwritten letters to their State Senators based on the district they live in and whether their Senators support or oppose the bill. MYD and its partners have established this website to create an easy conduit for legislative outreach to Senators in New York who still refuse to act on this crucial issue. Along with the sent emails, MYD will hand deliver to Albany a copy of every letter generated by the site.
So what are you waiting for?! If you are a NY resident, go to the site NOW and send a letter. If you're not a resident, go to the site, click on the link to email the info to your friends, and send it off to everyone you know in New York.
New Yorkers on facebook might want to join the New Yorkers for Marriage Equality group.
On a personal note, I should add that I'm incredibly proud of my friends and former Obama supporters who put this effort together. You guys ROCK! (and you know who you are)
And for those of you who want to wear your support for marriage equality, check out these amazing tshirts that kossack BrooklynWeaver is selling!
If you want one, walk on over to marriageequalitees.com and place an order.
For those of you who missed it, there was a diary about this earlier today.