(I posted this on the CDP Blog at blog.cadem.org–which you can comment on or please post here.)

This weekend’s CDP Executive Board Meeting kicks-off today at 5:00pm and runs till Sunday at noon. If you have any specific questions we’ll be checking our blog or you can email me directly at [email protected].

Please check out the full agenda at www.cadem.org/agenda, but I wanted to share a few of the highlights for this weekend…

Platform
Friday, Nov. 16 at 5pm, Public Testimony for Platform Committee
Any registered Democrat is welcome to give official testimony to the Platform Committee.

Book Signings
John W. Dean and Christine Pelosi and will sign their latest books from 6:30pm to 8pm and 8:00pm to 9:30pm respectively.

58-County Strategy
The CDP is dedicated to expanding services provided to local parties and activists for the 2008 election and beyond. The 58 County Strategy revolves around three principles: 1) building local party partnerships; 2) growing and strengthening activism; and 3) running targeted voter contact programs. The services include trainings, voter file access and support for campaign offices. Martha Gamez, CDP Deputy Political Director, will be making a special presentation about the 58-County Strategy at the following times:
? Friday, Nov. 16 at 8pm, Rural/Irish-American Caucus
? Saturday, Nov. 17 at 6:30pm, Computer & Internet Caucus
? Saturday, Nov. 17 at 8pm, California Democratic Council

Trainings
? Saturday, Nov. 17 from 12:30pm to 5pm-Campaign Skills Training
Sue Burnside and the CDP Political staff will hold a hands-on Campaign Skills Training that covers coalition building and voter contact techniques.
? Saturday, Nov. 17 from the 1:30pm to 3:00pm-Delegate Selection Workshop
The process to run to be an official delegate for the Democratic National Convention Committee can seem overwhelming, but the key to winning at the district level is knowing the rules and developing your own “campaign plan”. CDP staff will review the rules and provide information about how to participate in the delegate selection process.

Standing Committees
The Finance, Leg Action, Voter Services, Organizational Development, and Rules Committees will meet at various times from 3:00pm to 6:30pm on Saturday, Nov. 17. Resolutions Committee will meet from 3:00pm to 6:30pm on Saturday, Nov. 17, 2007. Timely resolutions will be considered and recommendations on positions for the Feb. 5 Primary Ballot initiatives will be discussed.

Saturday and Sunday General Sessions
This Executive Board meeting will feature guests speakers: Treasurer Bill Lockyear, Assemblymember Jose Solario, and Elizabeth Kucinich, wife of Presidential Candidate Congressmember Dennis Kucinich. Officer and Committee Reports will also be discussed and voted on during these general sessions.

So here at UCLA, several student groups are springing up that support the various candidates running for President.  Our Daily Bruin has the story here.

Many have begun to show their support for candidates by donating their time, and in some cases, money, to bring the message of their favored candidates to students across the campus. To achieve the same goal, some have formed organizations, created Facebook groups, and organized meetings and discussions.

“I believe this election is arguably the most important that will happen in our lifetime, and I think a lot of students are recognizing this and want to get involved in it,” said Teddy Schwartz, a third-year political science student and founder of the Bruins for Hillary student organization.

The group, which began after Schwartz and several friends decided to act on their personal interests in favor of Sen. Clinton, is only several weeks old. But, according to Schwartz, it already has the support of over 100 UCLA students and faculty.

“People are excited to see Hillary have a presence on this campus,” Schwartz said.

In addition to Bruins for Hillary, several other university-recognized student groups related to the upcoming elections have been formed, including Bruins for Obama, Bruins for Kucinich, and Ron Paul 2008.

Issues such as the war in Iraq, health care, higher education affordability for college students, and foreign policy, among others, have moved many of these groups to campaign for their candidates.

For Curtis Whatley, president of Bruins for Obama, it was Sen. Obama’s positions on the issues that has caused the public’s enthusiasm and support for the Illinois senator’s campaign.

“This campaign is about changing the political dialogue in America, and we are going to take it out of the gutter,” Whatley said.

Though the group is fully self-funded, it claims the support of over 500 UCLA students coming from varying backgrounds and levels of involvement.

If I actually had the time, I’d set up a Bruins for Edwards group.  But alas, my schedule simply doesn’t permit that.

We’re also hearing that the Daily Bruin will create a specific primary “beat” to cover the primary season in more depth.

BTW, some more perspective on UCLA college students.  Last night, I was with the Bruin Democrats at our debate watching party.  One of Edwards’ strongest lines in the debate was this:

All of us are going to be fine.

The question is: Will America be fine?

Here’s the video from that part of the debate.

Now, that line was deeply impactful for many on the blogs.  But at the party, most of the students started laughing at that line, mocking him for how corny it sounded.  Maybe we’re just the “coastal elites”, and the line works better among the middle and working classes.  But I was surprised at the disconnect between those of us who are progressive.

John Campbell [R, CA-48] thinks his public attacks on earmarks, including broadsides against Andre Agasi’s highly touted charter school in Las Vegas, a Sherwin-Williams research project, John Murtha, and Charles Rangel’s education center, mark him as a fiscal conservative for his base.  But Campbell’s votes in 2006 during the Republican control of the house mark him as a fiscal hypocrite.

Let’s be honest about John Campbell [R, Ca-48].  He is not a deficit fighter, but a political hack.  He now plays the curmudgeon on earmarks, but his 2006 voting record under the Republican majority in Congress is a different story.  For example, Campbell voted, without a hint of objection to ridiculous earmarks like:
  $1 million for Southern and Eastern Kentucky Tourism Department;
  $250,000 for the Montana World Trade Center;
  $300,000 for the Bronx Council for Marketing of Local Business Art Initiatives;
  $250,000 for the Bronx On-Water Learning Program;
  $3 million for the OPERATIONS OF THE OFFICE ON RIGHT-SIZING THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT’S OVERSEAS PRESENCE.
John Campbell’s claims fiscal superiority, but his votes in 2006 belie a different motive.  duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) said, “Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue.”  Campbell is the classic proof of the statement.

Look at my web-site for more on Campbell.  SteveYoungforCongress.com
You can contribute at Act Blue

Steve Young

If you didn’t already know, the Senate Judiciary Committee reported out a FISA bill yesterday that does not grant immunity to telecom companies for participating in the illegal spying on Americans in George Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program.  It’s convoluted, but there were basically two bills, a Title I and a Title II.  Title I had no immunity; Title II did.  Russ Feingold tried to strip immunity from Title II, but he failed, and DiFi voted for immunity.  But at the end of the day, only Title I got reported out.

This is NOT a total victory.  First of all, Harry Reid could decide to bring the Intelligence Committee’s bill, which has immunity, to the full floor.  And there will almost certainly be an amendment calling for immunity on the floor, even if an immunity-free bill is called up for vote.  So the Judiciary Committee basically punted.

But this James Risen article untangling what happened yesterday has an interesting little nugget halfway down the page.

Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the ranking Republican on the panel, is pushing a plan that would substitute the federal government as the defendant in the lawsuits against the telecommunications companies. That would mean that the government, not the companies, would pay damages in successful lawsuits.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, said in an interview after the vote Thursday that he would support a compromise along the lines of the Specter proposal.

Mr. Whitehouse was one of two Democrats who voted against an amendment proposed by Senator Russ Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, that would have banned immunity for the companies. “I think there is a good solution somewhere in the middle,” Mr. Whitehouse said.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat who also opposed Mr. Feingold’s measure, pleaded with Mr. Leahy to defer the immunity issue because she wants more time to consider several compromise proposals.

(I was under the impression that Herb Kohl also voted against the Feingold Amendment -ed.)

Feinstein had no need for compromise earlier in the week.  She was gung-ho for telecom immunity.  Clearly the pushback in the Senate amped up the desire for compromise, even if Specter’s is a fig leaf that would still get the telecoms off the hook while effectively stopping lawsuits through an expected invocation of state secrets.  But I have to assume that the heat Feinstein is taking from the grassroots back in California is driving her thinking as well.  If Leahy passed out immunity she would be seen as the biggest cheerleader for it – AGAIN, after Southwick and Mukasey.  It would be the last straw.  So she’s trying to get out in front and take credit for some kind of compromise that will eventually come.

So the progressive movement can take a little credit for winning this battle, as DFA did in a hyperventilating email last night.  We have not yet won the war, and there will absolutely be a floor fight and a bullshit centrist compromise to work against. 

This isn’t over.

(Also the rest of the bill is pretty good, and has things that the Bush Administration has vowed to reject, always a good thing.  But will the Congress cave?  That’s the big question.)

UPDATE: This DKos post notes that Harry Reid is going to bring up the Intelligence Committee bill as the main bill, with the Judiciary Committee bill as a substitute.  That’s the exact opposite of what he said yesterday.  This is very fluid and there’s likely to be shenanigans.

I do some work for the Yes on Prop. 93, Committee for Term Limits and Legislative Reform

Term limit reform is crucial to finding progressive solutions to the key problems of our state, ranging from education to universal health care to the environment and infrastructure. The Term Limits and Legislative Reform Act will give our legislators the time and experience they need to govern this state for all Californians, thereby reducing the influence of lobbyists and special interests.

That quote is from not from an incumbent legislator, or from some lobbyist trying to get close to said legislator, but from none other than Rick Jacobs, of the Courage Campaign. Prop 93 has built up an incredible array of support, from Mr. Jacobs to Malcolm Burnstein, Co-Chair of the CDP’s Progressive Caucus to all sorts of left and right leaning interest groups.  Why? Because our current term limit system contributes to a dysfunctional state government.

If you’ve read this site long enough, you’ll know that I have a bunch of hangups on the structure of our state government. The 2/3 rule for the budget and taxes, the out of control initiative process, and term limits. Well, guess what, let’s use one to fix the other, I suppose. In the end the decision on Prop 93 for me came down to one question: Would our government be more effective after this proposition passes? And to me, this is a no-brainer.  The endless parade of leadership, the constant campaigning for the next job, and the outsized importance of staff and lobbyists all suggest more experienced legislators could be more effective.

Like everything in politics, there’s sure to be some warts. But for a variety of reasons the concept of changing to a 12 year limit in one house seems to be the most effective, and likely to pass, reform.  I understand that not everybody agrees with me, but I’m happy to be working to get this measure passed. I welcome your comments, in either direction, and I’ll try to address them as quickly as possible. I’m headed down to E-board today, but I’ll make every effort to respond ASAP.

Every night during the tourist season, and on weekends during the school year, Disneyland lights up the night with some pretty good fireworks. I’m sure it has some negative impacts environmentally, but I’m not the one to quantify that.  But, there will be some daytime fireworks this weekend.  As many around here know, there’s an CDP E-board meeting in Anaheim this weekend. And, as you can clearly see if you read down this page, there will be some interesting issues at the resolutions committee, which I happen to sit on. Oooh, fun!

But seriously, I want everybody to know a few things.  The resolution committee has made a tremendous effort to open up the process up as much as possible. Is it perfect? Of course not, but credit where credit is due on working with grassroots leaders from the entire spectrum of the party.

I’ll make every effort to get some posts up about the E-board meeting as quickly as possible.

That should be our goal, right?  Teams of petition gatherers are using fraudulent means to get people to sign the Election Stealing ballot initiative petition, so every single signature they’ve gathered is tainted and should be thrown out.

I’m no lawyer, but it’s reasonable to assume it’ll take a lot of hard evidence to get that accomplished.  Hopefully the Sec of State will clarify what it would take to disqualify signatures.  I’m inquiring this morning. But it’s pretty clear that nothing can demonstrate this behavior better than video.

Personal accounts won’t be never be as good as video, so I say we focus on video instead. Particularly if you got them on tape on Day 1 and then Day 15 and they used fraudulent means both times, then certainly all the sigs gathered in between (at the least) should be tossed.  Plus, if people are on a public street, then clandestinely taping them couldn’t be illegal, could it? 

If not, then it sounds like it’s time to go out and get hidden video recorders and bust these guys. 

Watched some of the Democratic Candidate debate on CNN tonight filmed at the UNLV campus in Nevada.

Impressions:

(1) Wolfe Blitzer remains an idiot

(2) Nevada Democratic voters ask much more interesting questions than the news media

(3) Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Bill Richardson, Joe Biden, Dennis Kucinich aquitted themselves well.

(4) Barack Obama comes across as either less than well-informed or arrogant or a less than adequate listener

(5) Regardless, any of these candidates would make me proud to be a citizen of the U.S., and any of them are better candidates than any that the Repugnants have to offer

What did you think?