Date: Monday, July 26, 2010
From: Claudia C.
Group: USA.CAN

Bruce, we have also tried to start a chapter of the Coffee Party here on the east coast in Savannah. We had 4 meetings and hosted a candidate forum. It seems that most of the people who signed up just want to SAY they are a part of something, but they don't want to DO anything. Only 3 out of 65 who came to a meeting or signed up on FACEBOOK actually took part in putting together the forum. (We had 8 candidates come to the forum, with about 10 people attending to listen to them, and mostly those were other candidates. ) I guess people really just want to sit at home and blog and sign on-line petitions (so none of their neighbors or friends will know) . . . so good luck, hope it gets something accomplished.

We also tried to get people involved in campaigning for a progressive candidate running against our BlueDog Democrat in the House who voted NO on Health Care Reform. Since we didn't have the money to pay them to go out and canvass like the Obama campaign, it was a "wash." I was told in the rural counties that the Obama operatives all "went back home - up north." (Not many locals have the "guts" to come out openly and say they are progressives.)

We had a very good turnout for the Hands Across the Sand event last month, but I learned that the environmentals are very fragmented locally, and don't really see legislative influence as a strategy . . . which I just don't understand. At least 9 people I have met have decided to just move from the south, back to a saner part of the country. I guess our good weather is just not enough when you see swastikas and defamed pictures of Obama tacked to the lightpoles. JEEZ! ya think!!

Anyway, if progressives don't get up off their "duffs" and decide to take part in supporting President Obama openly and actively, we can kiss "YES WE CAN" goodbye . . . and we will have missed another opportunity to make change, like we did in the 70s. And if we want to see what the "conservatives" have in store for us if they take over in November, just watch the news from the U.K.