I’m here at the “internet media” table at the convention.  I was going to liveblog from my seat in the Region 13 section, but it’s so far back is ridiculous.  Seriously, guys!  The middle of LA, and we get put in the way back with the Young Democrats?!  What the heck is that all about?

Anyway, Congressman Susan Davis is up right now.  But here’s a picture of Juls at the media table:

More below the fold, starting with John Garamendi.

Garamendi starts with renewing a respect for human rights and civil rights.  This guy is pretty enthusiastic!  Now he’s talking about the CTA.

Garamendi continues by saying that we will finally establish a single-payer healthcare system.

Now I like this: it’s time to establish an energy policy that removes us from the most risky, dangerous places in the world.  Energy policy that frees us from carbon cycles; an energy policy where we’re not dependent on places around the world.  I need to get a hold of this guy’s legislative counsel and push Energize America.

Garamendi closes by thanking everyone for his support in his election.  I’ll put up more posts for the presidential candidate speeches.

Just got to San Diego for the convention–I’m posting from my satellite internet connection.  I’m at the workshop for new delegates right now, with rebelatheart sitting right behind me and cmanaster sitting right beside me.  rebel says hi to the whole calitics audience!

Hi everyone!! This is rebelatheart – I just wandered into the New Delegate session and was lucky to sit behind hekebolos =). I’m going to be running around alot so won’t be able to blog as much as some of the other guys, but I trust they will do a great job. See everyone who’s goinig to the blograiser tonight!!!

Art Torres just got done welcoming us all, and made specific mention of Jerry McNerney and Charlie Brown, as well as the CA-42 race for us Southern Californians.  Don’t forget to attend the Brew House!

(Remember dday! – promoted by blogswarm)

[Cross-Kosted]

Ok, so I know this has been leaked, but I figure it’s time to put up a diary on this: I am now a delegate from my Assembly District to the California Democratic Party!!  I’m pleased that so many of us, including dday and Rebelatheart, have also won–any other victorious bloggers, please feel free to chime in!

I’m sorry that I’m so late in posting this diary, but the official results were only tallied at around 8:00PST, for reasons I’ll explain below, and I was involved in supervising one of the necessary recounts.

Thank you so much to everyone that voted and helped spread the word–you were all phenomenal, and without you, I don’t think I would have won.  The margin wasn’t very large.

dday was there and took video, and the embed is below the fold.

First of all, the results:

We had a very large turnout for the election, with 214 ballots cast.  This dwarfs turnout for previous years in our Assembly District, and is a testament to how many more people are getting active in the party.  I received votes on 97 of those 214 ballots, for a total of 3rd place among the 24 male candidates.

If you read dday’s diary on his victory, you know that there are two competing slates.  Both dday and I were campaigning on the Progressive Slate, and like in his district, my slate swept, with all six men and all five women running on our slate taking delegate positions–though it was far closer in the 42nd than it was in the 41st.

Before I begin and describe the proceedings, I need to give a personal round of thanks to dday.  He got me involved and interested in running in the first place, and he also recommended that I join the progressive slate, rather than campaign on my own–in which case I would have had no chance whatsoever.  I’m looking forward to working with him and all my fellow victorious bloggers.

The meeting itself was kind of a madhouse–most of the people showed up early, voted and left, which they were completely entitled to do by CDP bylaws.  So even though we all went up and gave speeches before however many people cared enough to either stay and listen–or to actually allow their votes to be influenced by candidate statements–the vast majority of the ballots had already been cast by the time I went up to speak.  Here’s the video of my speech:

As you can see, I rushed it a little bit because I kind of bit off more than I could chew in the 1-minute timeframe that I had.  And yes, that orange shirt is an intentional reference to DailyKos and the community here that came out to support me!

There was a little feuding between our slate, and the members of the opposing slate–many of whom are fine progressives with whom I have absolutely no issues whatsoever, so it’s a little disappointing that we all had to run against each other.  But for the most part, everything was civil–with the exception of a little spat about the Executive Board election.  I won’t get into the details of that, but suffice it to say that one of the members of our slate was running for Executive Board in the 42nd, and most of the opposing slate supported the incumbent, and that’s where most of the division was.

The Presiding Officer of the meeting was John Heaner, the local party official from our Assembly District–if you watch the YouTube video of my speech, John is on the right in the suit with the red tie.  The Presiding Officer is in charge of running the meeting, timing candidate speeches, and supervising the vote count.  John did an admirable job in each of these respects, despite a fair amount of drama.

Our meeting officially began at 2, though balloting ended early, and the speeches began at 3.  After that, any remaining ballots were collected and the counting procedure began.  But there was a major complication–and one of the things I intend to do as a delegate is push for reform of these election procedures.  A minor issue, but an important one for the Democratic process.

You see, in addition to being able to cast ballots for delegates before the speeches and proceedings have begun, voters can also cast ballots for the Executive Board position before the proceedings.  The problem is that anyone who wins election as a delegate is eligible to nominate themselves for e-board.  But because voting on e-board is allowed before the delegate candidates have been certified, the appointed delegates running for e-board have an unfair advantage over the candidates that can only nominate themselves after they win their election.  I even received a couple of votes for e-board, though they were invalid because I didn’t nominate myself for the position.  So one of the things I intend to do is change the CDP bylaws to only allow votes to be cast for Executive Board once all nominations have been closed.

So anyways.  As dday wrote in his diary, CDP bylaws require that all ballots be counted twice.  Needless to say, this takes an awfully long time.  It was already 5:40 by the time the first count was announced and nominations for e-board could be accepted, and we had to be out of the meeting room by 6!  So John Heaner drafted two more counting teams for the delegate ballots, and quickly rushed through the e-board speech and nomination process, and the 20 or so die-hards that wanted to see the process through to the end walked a few blocks to a nearby Coffee Bean to finish our Party business!

At the Coffee Bean, I was selected by John to help oversee the counting of ballots for the Executive Board candidates, while others were chosen to help complete the second count of all the 214 delegate ballots.  While the vote for the Executive Board went without a hitch (Susie Shannon won), and the second count there was a mere formality for certification, the second count of the delegate ballots produced a completely different story!

You see, the male delegate who got the sixth most votes––Ricco Ross, a member of our slate–only got two more votes in the first count than the two candidates who were tied for seventh.  But the second count showed him trailing by eight!  So John, I and several others conducted a recount of the ballots of the three candidates in question.  The hand recount, affirmed as valid by all the participants in true Roberts Rules of Order fashion, affirmed that Ricco won by two votes–but with different vote totals than the first recount showed.

That concluded the final piece of business that John had to do to certify our election as delegate, and at around 8:05pm tonight, I officially became a delegate to the Democratic Party from my district!  And then I went home and wrote this diary 🙂

(Lots of great energy, remember dday! – promoted by blogswarm)

I was elated when I heard the news earlier today that dday and his entire slate won the Delegate positions from the 41st Assembly District in California, and I’m just posting an ever so brief reminder to help make me next.  My election is tomorrow (Sunday) at 2pm!  You have to be in line by 3 to be able to vote!  Here’s the location:

Beverly Hills Public Library Auditorium
444 N. Rexford Dr.
Beverly Hills, CA

There is a parking lot in the building, but it might fill up fast, so show up early!  Also, the auditorium room is upstairs at the end of a hall in case you get lost.

Please show up if you can!  I’ll need all the votes I can get.  I’ll see you there!

(This is a Cross-post of my recommended DailyKos diary about the subject–I didn’t feel like tailoring it back to Calitics.)

I’ve been participating here in the DailyKos community for almost exactly two years now, and in that timeframe, my fellow Kossacks have gotten to know me for any one of a variety of reasons.

Some consider me a decent diarist when it comes to analyzing the political issues of the day.  Many of you met me on my Crashing The States blogumentary roadtrip.  And still others of you know about my utterly incomprehensible fascination with spiders.  And I’ve enjoyed every single minute of it.

But today, I’m doing something I really never thought I’d do: I’m a candidate to be a delegate to the California Democratic Party from my Assembly District, and I’m asking for your vote on January 14th.

And, oh yes: if you can vote, you’ll find my name on the ballot as Dante Atkins.

Sounds small-scale, but it’s still important.  Please read below.

First, a little background on what an Assembly Delegate does, and how this process works.  From the California Democratic Party:

The California Democratic Party is governed by the Democratic State Central Committee (DSCC) of California, membership of which is a two-year position going from odd-year Convention to odd-year Convention.  Starting with the November 2006 election, the state party starts its reorganization, determining the new DSCC, which meets for the first time at the April 27-29, 2007 Convention in San Diego.  As the DSCC members meet annually at the State Party Conventions, they are also referred to as delegates to the State Party.

Approximately one-third of the DSCC is composed of all partisan-level (Assembly and higher) elected officials and nominees, and their appointments.  Approximately one-third are elected by Democratic County Central Committees, with each county getting delegates in proportion to the number of Democrats registered in their county.  The last third are elected in Assembly District Election meetings, held in January.  Each of the eighty (80) AD’s will elect 12 delegates, for a total of 960 delegates.

Any currently registered Democrat in California can vote in the Assembly District in which they are registered.  (If you’re in California and you want to find the Assembly District you’re registered in, use this lookup tool.)

That means that we, the Democratic voters of the various Assembly Districts of California, get to choose 1/3rd of all voting delegates at the California Democratic Party convention.  The CDP is badly in need of grassroots reform that supports progressive policies, and there’s no better way to do it than to vote in Assembly Delegates with progressive values.

And that’s exactly why I’m running.

I’m running for one of the 12 delegate positions–6 male, 6 female–from the 42nd Assembly District, a district that encompasses a large portion of the San Fernando Valley, as well West Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and the Los Angeles communities of Brentwood and the Miracle Mile.  But I’m not alone.  I’m on the Progressive Slate–a multi-district organization of delegate candidates primarily dedicated to the following five causes:

– Clean Money (including Election Protection)

–  Withdrawal of Troops from Iraq

–  Single Payer Healthcare  (Healthcare for Everyone in California)

–  Poverty Elimination

–  Investigations toward impeachment

To view our full platform, visit the link above.

And it’s not just me.

In the 42nd district alone, we have a a full slate of 11 other progressive activists besides myself–many of whom I have worked with locally for years, and I can personally attest to their outstanding work ethic and dedication to the progressive agenda.  In the 42nd district, the Progressive Slate consists of:

**WOMEN (on the 42nd Progressive Slate)**

Susan Lerner, Executive Director, Non-profit advocacy organization on Campaign Finance Reform

Susie Shannon: Producer, Air America Radio; Executive Director, Poverty Matters; Vice Chair, SoCal Grassroots

Jo Olson, Chair, Progressive Caucus of the CA Democratic Party

Joye Swan, Officer, Progressive Caucus of the CA Democratic Party

Elena Ong, Women’s Caucus, CA Democratic Party

Wendy Block, Progressive Activist

**MEN (on the 42nd Progressive Slate)**

Ralph Fertig, Assoc. Professor, USC; Board Member, Progressive Jewish Alliance; Board Member, Americans for Democratic Action of Southern California; Chair, Task force on homelessness at Leo
Baeck Temple*

Dante Atkins, blogger “hekebolos” on Daily Kos and conductor of internet outreach for the primary campaigns of Marcy Winograd in CA-36 and Mary Pallant in CA-24

Michael Jay, Coordinating Committee, SoCal Grassroots;
Executive Board, Valley Grassroots for Democracy; Senior Advisor, Marcy Winograd for Congress

Brad Parker, Vice Chair, Progressive Democrats of America Los Angeles

Ricco Ross, Progressive Activist

Dan Licht, Progressive Activist

The Caucus meeting for the 42nd Assembly District will be held THIS SUNDAY, January 14th, 2:00PM, at:

Beverly Hills Library Auditorium
444 N. Rexford Dr., Beverly Hills

NOTE: There is a $5 fee to “defray the costs of the caucus”–but this fee can be waived for financial hardship.

If you live in the 42nd Assembly District, PLEASE show up to vote for the Progressive Slate.  And bring as many like-minded friends as you can.  Turnout is crucial–the machine elements of the Party know how to bus their voters in, so the only way we’re going to be able to get the Progressive Slate elected is through massive turnout of fellow activists.

If you live in another Assembly District, click here to find the election information for your Assembly District, and then check the Progressive Slate website to find out if the Progressive Slate is promoting candidates in your district.  (hats off to my friend and fellow blogger dday (Dave Dayen), who is running in my neighboring 41st district, and fellow Kossack Ollieb, who’s running in the 43rd–see dday’s diary here to find out about other Kossacks that are running for Assembly Delegate in various districts.)

So, in conclusion: my name is Dante Atkins.  I hope you’ll vote for me and my fellow candidates on the Progressive Slate on January 14th.  And if you like to see bloggers actually doing something about local reform rather than just talking about it, consider throwing this a rec.

This is a very brief diary–I’m a regular poster on Daily Kos and MyLeftWing, but I don’t venture over here much.

The main purpose of my post here is to try to encourage some participation and organization with regard to activating ActBlue’s capability to channel funds to candidates in California races.

As you can see from ActBlue’s list, California only has $85.01 of the $10,000 ActBlue needs to raise to activate contributions for California State-Level races.

I’m wondering if anyone is interested in helping me lead a fundraising drive to get ActBlue activated in our state.