Precinct Leaders Troy and Milo had planned a fun local event at a bar called "Satisfactions". They invited all of Durham County's Democrats to come suffer together through the State of the Union speech by you know who, and then listen to the Democratic response in a conference call with Howard Dean, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi. Next thing you know, Howard Dean decides to attend!
Apparently the DNC had put out an e-mail asking if there were any interesting Precinct events happening, for Dr. Dean to drop in on. Troy (now known locally as "The Man"), replied and the rest is history. Here's Troy getting interviewed by one of the TV networks.
The day before the great event, I wrote a note to Dr. Dean, with a gift of two of my "Definition of a Democrat" t-shirts. Some of the ringleaders who were going to meet with him first, gave him the tees. They say he opened it up, read the t-shirt, and really liked it. That was exciting moment numero uno.
At Satisfactions, I volunteered at the Voter Education table which gave me a chair to stand on, so I could see him speak. What an inspirational speaker. He had solid ideas for universal healthcare, saying "36 other industrailized countries do it while balancing their budgets, and we can too." He said that in Vermont they used gov't money to insulate homes of the elderly, rather than subsidizing fuel. He said, "think of how many jobs it would create if we insulated every home and building in America!". wow, exciting moment number two, that's what I'm always saying. And he mentioned biofuels and other clean energy sources. In contrast, Bush said we need to break our addiction to oil by using "clean coal" and nukular powr. Puh-leaze!
But the third exciting moment happened two days later, and really knocked my socks off. I thought someone returned a t-shirt with no return address, and I opened it up to find this:
He was so thoughtful to mail this one back to me, signed.
More comments and photos are at durhamdemocrats.org. If you are a Durham Democrat, please browse through the site, they have just added a lot of useful info about local organizing.
The national website, Democrats.org has also posted pictures and comments at"State of the Union Watch Party Recap"
I heard they were talking about us at Daily Kos too. This guy came to North Carolina to attend, and said
"I witnessed, in North Carolina, the template for rebuilding the Democratic Party and reclaiming the country ..."
The grassroots keep getting stronger!
