Leader of Wyoming Democrats hits the road, issues call to arms

Wyoming Democratic Party Chair John Millin sent the following e-mail to Dems around the state. I'm on his mailing list because I was the secretary for the Laramie County Democrats when he served as its chair. I also may be the one of the few liberal bloggers in Wyoming. So, as we look ahead to September, when life (and politics) get really serious, consider this:

Fellow Democrat:

As I write this, I am preparing to go to Sheridan for a Sheridan County Democratic Party fundraiser and picnic on Saturday, August 18. Some other stops on my tour include:
September 8, Casper
September 16, Jackson
September 25, Cheyenne
September 29, Rock Springs

The basic message I am trying to share with Democratic Party activists around the state is that every seat is winnable, but we can’t win if we don’t compete. In 2006, there were 60 seats up for election in the Wyoming House of Representatives. Of those 60 seats, Democrats had candidates running in only 26. We lost a majority of the seats in the Wyoming House because we didn’t even try. I am highlighting this fact now because this is our biggest area for potential growth.

The good news of course is that in the 26 races where we fielded candidates, we won 17. Some of these wins were in heavily Republican districts. Deb Hammons won in Washakie County in a massively Republican district. Lori Millin beat a five-term Republican incumbent in a district where Republicans outnumber Democrats almost 2 to 1 and a Democrat had never held that seat. Their secret to success: work your butt off!

The message is that we can’t afford to give any seat to the Republicans. What I am asking you to do now is recruit candidates for races in your district or county (keeping in mind that the best candidate may be you). Also, the time to start recruiting is now. Mike Bell in Laramie County and Jim Thompson in Albany County have already gone over their aggressive recruitment strategies with me. Feel free to contact them or anyone from the state party if you are not sure how to conduct the process.

Please don’t leave this up to someone else. The state party has committed to an unprecedented level of training for our candidates. We will give them the tools to win, but we need you to find the candidates for us.

The other thing we are asking you to do is forward names and e-mail addresses of people you know who might be interested in getting on our e-mail contact list. We promise we won’t sell this list to any online Rolex or Viagra salesman. We just want to expand the base of grassroots activists in the Democratic Party.

As always, feel free to respond with questions or comments and have a nice weekend.