Geodog

Blogging Camp Wellstone: Day One, Introduction

The first sessions hasn't started, but already Camp Wellstone seems very different from the tech conferences that I usually attend. For a start, there is no wireless connection. Whatever I write will be posted after the fact, which suits my style better anyway. Secondly, the demographics are way different. There are a lot more women than men here, and a much wider age spread than one would usually find in technology. I'd say there are more 40 to 60 year-olds than any other cohort, not the early 20's crowd that I anticipated. All the people with grey hair aren't wearing $1,000 suits -- in fact, as far as I can tell none of them are. I'm also hearing some southern accents, something that I very rarely hear at tech conference -- the woman next to me is from Mississippi. Sadly, the vast majority of the conference participants' skin is as pale in hue as mine, as is also usually the case at the tech conferences.



The kickoff of the conference was a special guest, Al Franken. Before he got on stage I listened to one of the conference organizers, Jeff Blodgett, executive director of the Wellstone Action Network, and former Wellstone campaign manager, remind him that this is a non-partisan affair, to which Franken respondeds, "OK, I'll just make a lot of jokes."

Franken got up and spoke. Here are my incomplete notes:

Paul was amazing, he touched people. Paul knew both my parents. In 2002 I came in to Minnesota to campaign for Paul. My mom was sick, the first thing Paul asked was how "How was your mom". When he heard she wasn't doing well, and I didn't know what to do about it, he said, "touch means a lot". Paul was a hugger and toucher. It wasn't the same kind of touch as your governor, where you feel disgusted and humiliated afterwards, it was reaching out.

The reason I am doing Air America is to get a foothold on radio. ... If you read my book, one of the most important chapters is the one about how the right lied about the memorial around Paul's death. We need to fight back -- oops, I know this is a non-partisan

I'm a uniter not a divider, we need to unite to fight these a**holes. This is a non-partisan event, so if there are any a**holes here, I'm sorry.

This election is just a start. On Nov 3 the work needs to start, again. We are the patriots, we are the people who love this country, we are going to take it back. As Paul said, this country belong to the people who work hard, so let's work hard to take it back.

According to someone in the audience, Franken can be heard in the Bay Area on LQKE AM 960.

Then Jeff Blodgett gave an introduction and inspirational speech:

• Organize to take back your country in 2004.


• Rebuild a progressive movement in this country.


• This is the 47th Camp Wellstone, the last one of the season. Camp Wellstone has trained over 7,000 people.


• We do camps in conjunction with Grassroots Solutions, a Minnesota company. Many of the trainers are volunteers, donating their time and work to help build the movement.


• Non-partisan. We offer this training to anyone who wants it. But we are particularly welcoming to people who share Paul's point of view.


• Paul Wellstone was a Senator from 1990-2202.


• Wellstone Action formed by his sons and his political staff, who thought there were things to learn from the way that Paul practiced politics.


• Paul Wellstone was a community activist and teacher for years before he was senator.

The Wellstone Triangle
Community Organizing - build the base - an ongoing year round activity.

• Develops 1-to-1 relationships


• Build power and leaders from the bottom up.


• Start with Issues at the center of people's lives


• Build coalitions and bridge differences among people


• Ongoing process for long term change


• Foster new leadership, bring more people into the process.

Grassroots Electoral Politics - PW was a progressive with a massive field organization.

• Actively engage votes in conversation.


• Harness the power of a highly energized base


• Recruit a huge base which goes out. Wellstone in 2002 had 17,000 volunteers.


• Adept at recruiting new voters -- young people and new voters from immigrant communities.


• Engage new voters is how you win.


• Find common ground between very disparate groups.


• Make people feel that their participation matters.


• Successful electoral campaigns focus on clear messages, and focus on numbers.

Progressive Public Policy - direction and agenda for action
Ideas matter. Big ideas. Progressives need to articulate ideas in ways that people can understand and that connect to their lives and values. Think about how use language.
Progressives can win with big ideas. We are the majority and we need to act like it.

The other element is leadership. Conviction politics. PW operated from strong convictions and an ethical core. What you saw was what you got. People, including swing voters, liked that style, and voted for him. Wellstone was the only person up for election in 2002 who voted against Bush's Iraq resolution. Wellstone voted his convictions. That vote led to a big boost in his poll numbers. That's a lesson for leaders. [In my experience in business life, people respond to leadership. Good and honest leadership is rewarded with support]. PW was an empowerment leader. He believed in highlighting the leadership of others. He was always talent scouting, looking for other leaders.

Blodgett concluded with this quote:

"And so we shall have to do more than register and more than vote. We have to create leaders who embody virtues we can respect, who have moral and ethical principles we can applaud with enthusiasm.
-- Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

And then Blodgett showed a great get out the vote video, with lots of footage of Paul Wellstone, some of which brought tears to my eyes.

Posted by Geodog at October 2, 2004 12:27 AM | TrackBack