November 5th
I woke up early this morning to drive my daughter to school and on the way she remarked how pretty the leaves were. We turned east and drove into a beautiful pink sunrise. I guess the world didn't end last night. Today is a new day.
I spent yesterday poll watching. In my assigned precinct we had surprisingly few issues. Early in the day, the Democratic lawyer who was assigned to my precinct and I got into a bit of a discussion. We had a guy who claimed he had just moved but could not prove residency. At one point she suggested that he could be considered homeless. If he were, Section 48A5(b) of the Iowa Code reads:
I objected, that the person was not homeless. He had stated the address at which he resides. Rather he could not provide proof of residency. Further, it was not appropriate in the polling place for her to coach the voter. She later agreed that it was improper and we had no further issues. In fact we got along quite well, our children go to the same school and are involved in band and choir together.
Yesterday evening I went to our county Victory Party. There is plenty of commentary on the statewide results, so I'll be a little more parochial and focus on my county. The presidential results weren't really a surprise but I was crushed when Miller-Meeks lost. Then Reed. Then the county races started coming in. Mahacek, Rosenthal, Erceg, Zahn all lost, the one bright light in county government was Brent Oleson who handily won his supervisor's race. In the legislature, Potts, Nemecek, and Childers all lost. We had two more reasons to celebrate, Nick Wagner won handily in HD36 and Renee Schulte squeaked by winning by 47 votes in HD37. We'll be on pins and needles for a few days because the margin will likely trigger a recount. At this point I do not know how many provisional ballots were cast but they may come into play.
As for our party, we need to begin looking to the future now. The first step is to analyze our failures (and our successes) from last night. We need to look at absentee ballots, GOTV, volunteer organization and more.
As a member of the State Central Committee, I serve on the Organization Sub-Committee. Many of these issues wll fall into our area of responsibility. We need your input — we need to listen to our county organizations. 2010 is going to be a crucial year the work starts now.
Hi! I love your blog, just haven't yet commented. This campaign season instead of volunteering for the overall GOP, I just picked some candidates I was really excited about and volunteered for them. Why? Because overall, I no longer have faith in the GOP and am frustrated with their inability to hold to the fiscal and social responsibilities outlined in the party platform. Once the GOP, gets back to those principles it will be a lot easier for people to volunteer for the party. You can't get volunteers if the volunteers don't believe in the organization they are volunteering for.
Also, the GOP needs to articulate conservative solutions to problems instead of ignoring the problems. For example, universal early childhood education. Instead of just shying away from a discussion on such an issue, let's articulate conservative alternatives because they are out there! The data is out there to be used to show WHY not universal early childhood education.
Last, I think we need to change who we target. I'm a consistent GOP voter and yet I get FOUR applications for absentee from the state GOP. Why not use the money and effort to target people who aren't consistent voters? Also, from volunteering at the caucus to a couple of local candidates, the voters lists seem to really disorganized.
That's my two cents! Keep up the good work!
Posted by: palmofdeborah(from IDA) | Nov 6, 2008 1:14:43 PM
Dave.
Check out rebuildtheparty.com
good operations manifesto.
Brent
Posted by: Brent Oleson | Nov 7, 2008 8:42:21 PM