In our fundraising efforts to attend the Democratic Convention in August, we've decided to focus on a small donor campaign.  We figured out that it'll take us 240 people contributing $25 each for us to reach what we need to go to Denver and provide you with the best convention coverage in America.  So far, we have the equivalent of 42 ($1050), leaving us 198 to go.  Anyone reading this should be able to donate $25 to help us get there.

Go to PayPal and donate through our Florida Progressive Coalition account (quinnelk@gmail.com), or you can write a check to Florida Progressive Coalition and send it to me:

One of the key things that we should start to do as activists is expand our playing field when it comes to thinking of elections.  Howard Dean's 50-state strategy and Barack Obama's commitment to fighting in every state and territory have produced results that show us this approach is one that can lead to positive change.  It can give candidates a chance to win who might not otherwise do so, it can send a message to Republicans that places they have assumed are theirs by birthright must be earned and it can sap Republican resources and make them spread their spending and activity to places they usually wouldn't bother to worry about.

A first step we can take down this road is to support good candidates in supposedly red districts.  Frequently this will mean spending money outside your own congressional district.  If we only focus on our own districts, we'll never be in the majority, we need to work together to change the state, not just our own backyard.  And the more candidates we help and the more candidates we help win, the more our congressional delegation will owe progressives when it comes time for them to vote on things like the recent FISA/telco immunity fiasco.  Like it or not, politics works on the you-scratch-my-back-I'll-scratch-yours level a lot of the time.  If we scratch their backs with our votes, our voices and our checkbooks, they'll have to scratch ours.

At the recent Jefferson-Jackson fundraiser in Hollywood, I met a candidate in this exact situation.

Democratic candidate for U.S. Congress District FL-14, Larry Byrnes is challenging an unfair and undemocratic ruling that has kept him off the ballot for this August.  

The Republican-controlled Florida Division of Elections (which you may remember from its recent appearance in the movie Recount) has determined that Byrnes will be a write-in candidate in August, defying the will of the people and the intent of the law.  Laws like the one used to keep Byrnes off the ballot are meant to prevent voter fraud and to help ensure that the will of the people is reflected at election time.  

On April 15, 2008, Byrnes received a letter telling him that he had qualified as a candidate in the upcoming election.  They didn't tell him that he needed anything further.  He later noticed that his name was not appearing on the elections website.  He called the division and learned that he had not submitted a required notarized loyalty oath, which was required to be submitted the following day.  He sent it by overnight courier and it arrived by the deadline.  After the deadline, he was told that he had submitted the wrong loyalty oath.  He had inadvertently signed the loyalty oath for a write-in candidate, not a Democrat.

If you remember, a while back a Pastor Hayes Wicker of Naples had this to say about gay marriage:

This is a tremendous social crisis, greater even than the issue of slavery.

Not surprisingly, a lot of people, such as myself had some problems with that statement.  

Wicker, for some reason, took umbrage at the outrage against his hate speech.  Here's what he said in a letter to the editor:

This is the type of thing that state/local blogs can be particularly effective at leading efforts on...

As I mentioned on the radio show the other day, one of the things we're going to do is make sure that every prominent public official in Florida is on record as to where they stand in terms of the Hate Amendment, the latest proposal to ban gay marriage in Florida.  Our job now is to find out where everyone stands on Amendment 2, including:

Wow.  At first glance, that's all I can say about the comments from Pastor Hayes Wicker of Naples, Florida.  Here's what he said at an anti-gay event last week:

This is a tremendous social crisis, greater even than the issue of slavery.

Wow.  

One day into our campaign to get our congressional challengers to sign on to the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq, we've already had one victory.  Samm Simpson has endorsed the plan.  Knowing Samm, I figured this was an issue that was important to her and that she'd be eager to sign on.  We should reward Samm for singing on, so go here and contribute what you can. Hey, I'm a poor adjunct professor/blogger and I was able to muster a few bucks.  It's the least you can do. And it's important.

Those of us active in the Netroots and blogging (as well as the more traditional grassroots) need to make sure that we reward candidates who engage in responsible, progressive behavior.  Endorsing the Responsible Plan is a great step in that direction.  Florida now has seven challengers signed on to this plan (still the top state), and you should consider dropping them a few bucks if you can.  It'll show them you appreciate their efforts and encourage others to do the same.

Which is why I'm posting this message.

Florida Progressive Coalition hereby endorses the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq.

Generally, we try to focus on state and local issues but we decided to go outside that for once.  Why?  A number of reasons: