Live blog from the GWCC DPG festivities

9:20 P.M. Ok, my chauffeurs are leaving, so I will have to let Chairman Buckley finish his speech without me. This was definitely a much better JJ than I was expecting – kudos to our leadership for pulling this together (pulling this out of the same body regions from which Sarah Palin’s “thoughts” come from). Sayonara, y’all.

UPDATE: Some dear person (Video by John S. Quarterman for Lowndes County Democratic Party) uploaded Ray’s speech to YouTube, start here for beginning...work your way through the 10 links.

9:13 P.M. People are finally starting to clear out – guess Congressman Lewis was the real keynote speaker. Nevertheless, Chairman Buckley is on stage now.

 

image

8:59 P.M.If this doesn’t make you want to stand up and cheer yourself hoarse, you’re in the wrong party. Or maybe running the stupidest primary election in history…

UPDATE: same nice person (Video by John S. Quarterman for Lowndes County Democratic Party) uploaded part of Congressman Lewis’s speech here.

 

image

8:50 P.M. We’ve just honored our Murphy Award recipients. Gee, some of those people up there look familiar… Congratulations Mel!!

 

image

Congressman Lewis is being awarded a lifetime achievement award by Mayor Reed. Our chairman’s fearless prediction that we’d be out of here by 9 is proving to be humourously inaccurate, but no one seems too fatigued yet.

8:24 P.M. Richard Ray introduced one of our speakers tonight. Yeah, he can speak for me too.

 

image

Our speaker is Wisconsin State Senator Lena Taylor, who seems like a very strong and valuable presence, over and above being one of the 14 who took the fight against Wisconsin’s unions to the streets. She’s serving up some real red meat to the labor folks in the crowd. Some of our own legislators could learn something about unions from her. Love it.

 

image

8:09 P.M. Looks like we are getting going with the program now. Obviously Congressman Lewis (who so speaks for me) has been a photo op magnet. I swear someone on stage just said that Georgia was founded in 1932 ;-P We are recognizing our state House and state Senate members, and this year at least the bad things that happened are not really their fault. Rep. Abrams is on stage and she can speak for me too.

 

image

image

 

7:48 P.M. Really nice turnout – have to emphasize how good it is. Off year, terrible time for Democrats in this state, state party’s finances in disarray (but getting better), and yet it’s packed in here. Maybe reports of our demise are premature.

 

image

image

 

7:37 P.M. Everything I have heard up to this point is that this event is packed to the bursting point, and it sure seems like it. Amazing turnout. Maryline Blackburn has sung the national anthem and Mike is opening this dinner.

 

image

image

 

7:25 P.M. After another extended break (read: Taco Mac time), and the obligatory pre-dinner chit-chat, we’re getting ready to start the dinner portion of tonight’s events.

 

image

4:40 P.M. Yay! We have passed our delegate selection plan without too much drama. We have affiliate reports from the GADCC and YDG, both of which I will omit for sanity’s sake.

4:23 P.M. Dr. Hate: “This is not a question.” Many people muttering: “THEN SHUT UP” Although dealing with Dr. Hate is probably something a guy from New Hampshire needs to learn how to do…

 

image

4:15 P.M. For being from New Hampshire, he sounds kinda normal. Apparently New Hampshire, is, indeed, not an ethnically diverse state (weird actual comment from speaker redacted). I think I’m glad there are no TV cameras here. (Oh, NOW he busted out that Yankee accent…) Questioner: “Does Michelle Bachmann have a chance in New Hampshire?” Chairman Buckley: “Is there press here?” Mutterings: “Where’s Ataru?” (Yes I’m here. Further comments redacted, because I’m nice 😉 )

4:00 P.M. We are wrapping up a 20 minute break (do we have to?) . Nikema is introducing our guest speaker, New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Raymond Buckley. His first words: “There’s a lot of you.” Duh, I think we have enough people here to make a state house district in New Hampshire.

3:16 P.M. Second best news of the day: Apparently all the drama with the census calculations from last time has been withdrawn, and we’re just moving on now. Woohoooooo!

3:11 P.M. Apparently the rumor is that they are trying to draw John Barrow into a district with, and drawn for, Chip Rogers. Insert “boo”ing from old woman in The Princess Bride here.

3:02 P.M. After a caucus report from Pedro, Mike just gave a shout out to the recent events in New York! Yay!! Mike reports that we are ok financially for the next three or four months independent of what happens cash wise with tonight’s JJ dinner. Sadly, we don’t get a budget until after the dinner tonight. According to Mike, we need $1.5 million a year to perform optimally, but are bringing in $900,000. Sigh…

2:50 P.M. LaVerne just discussed her role as deputy general counsel. Apparently we (DPG) escaped some possible financial penalties due to an elections commission vote that split 3-3 – 3 Republicans in our favor, and 3 Democrats against. Weird!

2:38 P.M. Russell is up giving what I hope is the treasurer’s report. Given what I have heard, I’m just hoping for no drama (cue a certain Black Eyed Peas song). (5 minutes later) It isn’t a treasurer’s report.

2:35 P.M. Apparently there are 3,540 elected officials in Georgia, and Miguel is going to call all of them. Yay!!!!

2:31 P.M. Page is our new ED 🙂 Sadly I missed a few minutes of the intervening time looking for my glasses (thank you beer). R.J. just got done giving a very brief report.

2:16 P.M. Well, we are now getting underway and settling in for a long meeting.

image

2:01 P.M. So much for an on-time start to things, despite Mike’s protestations to the contrary. Check in is proceeding at a frenetic pace. I did just hear from Mike that our dear, dear friend Page was unanimously recommended for the ED position and will be announced once things get under way here. The news could not be better 🙂

image

12:06 P.M. And now we enter the part of the day where we let the exec committee do their funky exec thang, and we (Yes, “we”, I’m not the only degenerate in this party) go to Taco Mac until the state committee meeting starts. Feel free to join us.

11:33 A.M. I’m in the room with Mike and the agenda is the committee situation. Apparently this is the “core group” for committees. At Melanie’s suggestion it sounds like there’s going to be inter-committee conference calls scheduled through the remainder of the year.

11:24 A.M. Meetings are ongoing – attendence is a little sparse but those of us who are here are valiantly carrying on.

 

image

image

image

 

10:50 A.M. It begins. Yet again, it begins… Supposedly caucus meetings have been going on, and we have the scintillating GADCC board meeting beginning shortly. Anyone wanna celebrate New York’s induction into the GLBT caucus at Taco Mac in the meantime?

 

image


Posted

in

, ,

by

Tags:

Comments

6 responses to “Live blog from the GWCC DPG festivities”

  1. JMPrince Avatar
    JMPrince

    As the late Peter Falk would say, ‘One more thing…’ The Jazz band was excellent again this year. Really top rate & in good form both before & during the JJ. That’s much appreciated & was noticed. Thanks. JMP

  2. ire Avatar
    ire

    Whoa…

  3. JMPrince Avatar

    Looking more closely at the pics, I do note the record of A/B taking some of the better pics of me since, well almost HS days. Naturally you’ve got to pick a really favorable angle, in a crowd, from behind. JMP

  4. JMPrince Avatar

    Further thoughts on the meetings. Having the girls volley ball teams meeting at the same time was often just about the only levity added on the day. Some nice color. I know, call me a ODB. Mentioned it to the wife too, she laughed.

    But far from objections on the progressive tone or relative degrees of ‘snoozing’, (seemingly engaged in everyone by the end of the night), it was the character of the forced march over the span of 12 or so long hours that was distressing to many. Far too long somehow.

    Cong. Lewis gave a magnificent speech, and always makes us proud to call him one of our own & one of our best. Always upholding the best progressive traditions of our party & state. State Senator Lena Taylor also rocked the house with a very inspiring speech.

    Was also surprised to learn during the JJ that Ga. was ‘founded in 1932’ vs. 1732, (um, Will??) But hey, who the hell knows history. Earlier I mentioned Cong. Phil Crane (R, Il.) to our new (hopefully) ED Page Gleason, she smiled and said, ‘Well some of us are not that old’. Well yes, but evidently if you’ve had a scandal with pages Before the internet? It gets expunged from your record too! Who knew? But he served until 2005 too, so vaguely memorable to some, and ran against Reagan (from the right) in 1980. So something for Political Jeopardy perhaps.
    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_Crane

    Had an early update from the DFI, and so was on the look out for this ‘stuff; keynote speaker Raymond Buckley, NH Party Chair, had dusty brogans. Worse, he’s not as funny as Chris. The rest of us work with what we’ve got. The shoe shine stand was empty too.

    And like ‘Dr. Evil’ of movie fame, (or Dr. Smartass in my household), Dr. Hate is really a vainglorious description. If anyone has problems with our DPG members they should always be willing to engage them. That’s where the entertainment begins. And often, even for the YD’s, it the best entertainment on the day too.

    But lots of new folks met and friendships renewed, which is always the best part of the day. Had wanted to mention this to Zan on the day after seeing her sharing her chair at the event:
    http://pressreleases.kcstar.com/?q=node/10423

    I don’t know quite how to count these things, (unlike the highly detailed & complex Delegate Selection Plan), but seemingly this meeting has slightly fewer ‘wheelers’ than in the past. Who knows? I missed one or 2 of them. I know, I’m strange like that. JMP

  5. Julez Avatar
    Julez

    Couple quick comments:

    They were not in fact actual “caucus” meetings, they were just for the Chairs and Vice Chairs..of course anyone is welcome to any DPG meeting, they are not closed to the public. But that’s why attendance wasn’t as you might expect

    I was very pleased by the progressive tone of the JJ program, finally we got to hear from folks with a point of view not stuck in 1955.

    The next event with likely be the GADCC dinner and SC meeting, I expect a snooze fest. Last night is going to look like rock concert compared to that. Anyone who was grumpy about the progressive tone of last night will surely enjoy the Sept meeting then. ~SNARK~

    Fun times at Manuels, I think the YD’s raised some cash.

    Congressman Lewis’s speech was classic and I hope his likely primary opponent got a taste of what he’s up against. As we say “Bless his heart”

  6. JMPrince Avatar

    Thanks A/B, Good coverage & a nice turnout w/o most of the issues that plague such things. Sounds like the DNC Convention housing deal is going to get very interesting. Congrats to Page & all the night’s award winners. Please do help out Dan Matthews running for State House Dist. 113, the runoff is coming July 19. JMP

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *