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Supporting knowledgeable candidates who intelligently address the issues

Tue, 12/04/2012 - 14:18 — augustin

A new friend wants to support what he call the "Knowledge Democrats", candidates who are true progressives and who do not contend themselves with repeating talking points.

Unfortunately, if such a candidate campaigns in a district that is considered "unwinnable", they are usually ignored by the progressive heavyweights. I think it is short-sighted of any political party not to have a so-called "50-states" / "435 districts" strategy. (Money is not everything!)

I was invited to look at Jerry Tetalman1 as an example of such a candidate. He ran as a Democrat in a very Republican district and, without surprise, lost by a lot. 2 But here is not the point. The point is what can we do to promote such candidates, and more importantly: the values that they stand for, regardless of their electoral prospects?

This blog entry is meant as a discussion starter, to see what we can do together and what we should document...

  1. 1. His former campaign web site, jerryforcongress2012.com, is now offline.
  2. 2. See: United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections_in_California,_2012 and California's_49th_congressional_district.

Comments

Tue, 01/15/2013 - 08:58 — pipsorcle

Yes sir

In going back to the Howard Dean 50 state strategy instead of the Rahm Emanuel strategy (in fact, Emanuel should be out of the Democratic Party's way as much as possible), that's where the Knowledge Democrats movement can start.

1) Knowledge Democrats can and will promote candidates who are not about talking points so much but about genuinely being original political figures. Often times, this requires individuals who don't set themselves out to be career politicians but to make a difference in general regardless of politics or not. Sometimes when I turn on the channel to MSNBC, I see the Democrats in the Democratic Party really talking like pundits and everyone else. I just want people to speak their mind, as Jesse Ventura would say.

2) On the other hand, it's important to emphasize that the Knowledge Democrats movement is about knowledge and inclusiveness, not about exclusiveness where everyone keeps talking about which Democrats have the momentum and which are always promoted. I say, let's promote them all but on the other hand, I won't support a candidate who has radical views that don't fit with real Democratic values of the Democratic Party. Well, I'll support one person like that if he/she is guaranteed to give Nancy Pelosi back her gavel just by that one additional House seat. Then of course, that person can be challenged for re-election by a more progressive candidate, depending on of course the Congressional district and how red or not so red it is.

Wed, 01/16/2013 - 13:43 — augustin

Project home page

The home page for the Knowledge Democrats project is here:
http://minguo.info/usa/wiki/knowledge_democrats
It's a wiki page. Any member can edit it. Soon, we'll start adding child pages, as required to organise the project.

I barely had time to make a start today. I will continue organizing things in the days ahead. Feel free to improve the wiki article above, as you deem fit.