Purple/red state and local Dem party workers, volunteers: What differences do you see

[blm]

in the party's organization the last two years under Howard Dean from the organizational stewardship of Terry McAuliffe?

My personal story is that when I moved to Horry County in SC in 2000, there was NO Dem party office in the entire Myrtle Beach area and not even a phone number. I had lived previously in LA and NYC and I was used to blue states that had lots of funding and support from national headquarters, so this level of neglect was eye-opening to me then.

When we moved to NC in 2004, the Dem HQ I volunteered at in a large city was located in the backroom of a flower shop. There were many people who were volunteering but we only had access to a few old computers and 4 phonelines.

Since Dean took stewardship of the DNC, our red state was given support from national DNC and we now have our own small building for a headquarters. What a difference a functioning operation makes.

What changes have you seen? Or - what changes do you EXPECT to see over the next year for your state and county's organization and infrastructure in preparing for 2008?

[mtnsnake]

1. Those are nice changes

Howard Dean is doing a good job.

[blm]

6. He is - he had ALOT of work to do with still more to go.

.

[oasis]

2. In Hawaii (blue) we expanded our state office to include central committees on Kauai, Maui,

Hilo/Kona and Oahu.

p.s. I am no longer a resident of the Aloha State.:cry:

[blm]

5. How is your current state doing?

.

[oasis]

9. Nevada (magenta/violet)

I voted in the last election, but I'm not active with the state or local Democratic party.

[rhino47]

3. Here in Crawford Co Pa the democratic party is in shambles.

On their website they deleted the young/college democrats link .This was the same young democratics group that got an 18 old elected mayor to Linesville Pa.The country dems did not lift a finger to help.They have refused to
list northwest pennsylvania democratic league`s link.There was a splinter with in the crawford county democratic leadership about a year ago.The shame of it is there are 32 people listed in crawford county who wants/wanted a meet up and noone contacted them.I called 6 times the crawford`s office and noone got back to me (in 2004).When I finally did contact an official I was told to go to mercer county where we had a chance.Northwest dems was created to override this attitude.

[blm]

4. In your view is it heading to improvement from 2004 or is it getting worse?

And, has the national party been informed of the problems you have witnessed?

[rhino47]

10. I am rather sure the national party has been informed.

I am just crushed the local party is in such disarray.

[blm]

11. Probably true that Dean is focusing on states LONG neglected - the red and

some swing states. I would add Pennsylvania to the swing state category, myself, mainly because it such a crucial state for Democrats to keep and it shouldn't be taken for granted.

[PresidentObama]

7. I live in southern Missouri....

....And I haven't been half as active since 2005 when it seemed the old time Democrats in the area were in a power struggle with the other Democrats. I remember having a conversation with one of the old time Democrats as I recall them talking about how Dean's 50 state strategy would be the end of the party. The older Democrats were very disorganized and I just got tired of the bullshit of the local politics.

[sandnsea]

8. Flipped the statehouse in Oregon

The field organizers were able to set up a volunteer ground operation and target the mid-term drop off and are given credit for flipping our state house for the first time in 16 years and possibly retaining the margin needed to keep the governor.