How was your Meetup tonight?

[GumboYaYa]

In St. Louis we had close to 200 people. By the end it was standing room only.

We all wrote letters to New Hampshire voters promoting Dean. It was pretty cool to communicate with a living breathing voter. I know I would pay much more attention to a personal letter versus some glossy campaign flyer. This campaign is revolutionizing the way voters connect with the candidates.

After we watched the Larry King appearance, the Texas commercial, and a message from Dean, the microphone came open for audience participation. One central message resounded from everyone. WE HAVE THE POWER TO BEAT BUSH.

There were also loud calls for unity in the Democratic party and support for whomever wins the nomination.

This is what politics is intended to be. I hope your Meetup went as well as ours did.

[CMT]

1. 200 in St. Louis--That is fabulous

especially since it is in Gep's neck of the woods. We had about a 100 at Meetup in Madison,Wi and also wrote letters. Hope it will be as effective as the letter writiing to Iowa last month.

[disgruntella]

2. i'll be going to the next one

I just signed up for a Dean meetup in Montana - very happy to see there was one in my conservative town.

It was also interesting for me to see that there are lots of other types of meetups - people have started them for Kerry, Kuchinich, Edwards, etc. (I was pretty clueless about the whole "meetup" concept I guess)

And I'll be going to the Linux meetup, hopefully to meet a good-looking geek ;)

[GumboYaYa]

4. It is a great concept.

You connect with other like-minded people and leave energized to do more. Tonight I ran into one of my neighbors at the Meetup. Until I saw him sitting there I had no idea he was a liberal. Now we are planning on canvassing our neighborhood.

[Cha]

3. I'm so impressed! We only had about 25 but this is in republican

country! I drove 40 miles to get to my first meetup! I was so excited after hearing about them for so long and finally just taking my car and finding the place.

I got my material to write my two letters to New Hampshire residents!

That's so neat you saw Dean on Larry King Show. Our organizer's father saw Dean on King and asked his son for the address to send Dean some money because he was soooo Impressed with him! And I guess his father never gives money to anything he doesn't have to!

Thanks for asking, Gumbo YaYa!

[janx]

11. Hey zidzi, where are you?

At the MeetUp tonight in Boulder, part of the discussion was about how moderate Republicans like hearing about Dean--and the guy started the discussion wasn't from the city of Boulder.

I know it's still early, but many people like what Dean has to say.

[Cha]

18. Hi Janx~! I was in Utica, NY, tonight for my first meetup!

Here's a thread I started earlier on my escapade!


"Went to my 1st Dean Meetup in Utica, NY, tonight!"


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=106&topic_id=1191&mesg_id=1191


I love Boulder! Lucky you! :-)

[janx]

21. As I said, I don't live in Boulder, but close to it, and yes, it's nice.

For some reason I thought you were a Coloradan. No matter. Utica NY is great too, and I'm glad you went to your first MeetUp. It sounds as if you really enjoyed yourself. They can't help but to get even better as time goes on. I enjoyed the posts on the thread you linked!

[Cha]

24. That's cause I was born and raised in Colorado!

Left when I was 18 and went back for two years from 1990 to '92 and then left for Hawaii and in '98 moved to New York.

Great ..I'm glad you like the posts.. I just thought of a DUer while I was posting this. What happened to Hawkeye? Anybody know?

[liberalmuse]

5. We had about 50 people, or more...

I'm in a red state, but we're hoping to, at the very least, get Dean through the primary, and by some miracle turn this perpetually red state into a blue one in 2004. I wrote 2 New Hampshire letters myself, and took a couple more names home to write some more.

Tonight was the first time I've seen Dean speak (they showed video clips). Wow!!! I was already excited from everything I'd been reading about him, but had no idea he was so impressive and presidential in his television appearances. He's got to be Rove's worst nightmare. He's America's best hope for leadership right now.

On edit: it's like trying to plug up the Hoover dam with a cotton ball...

[GumboYaYa]

7. Fifty is great where you are.

I bet it grows to 100 by the next meetup. We are going to two locations in ST. Louis because we have outgrown all the places available to us.

It is great to see people taking an interest in politics.

[bleedingheart]

6. AMAZING

Went to the Pittsburgh meetup in Homestead and there had to be over 100 in attendance... standing room only!

People from Butler County, Wexford, North Huntingdon (me) and from all other parts of the Pittsburgh area!!! It is an amazing feat to get people from all over to attend an event like this for a candidate 9 months before the primary in a state that will not be a "deciding" partner in the primary... we are a big state in the general election with 22 electoral votes though!

I was tremendously impressed....lots of young people!

He is attracting a lot of attention!!!

[GumboYaYa]

8. Awesome.

I sat with some college students tonight. They are all over Dean. The students I talked to are ready to get out and make a difference.

We had a cross-section of America at our meeting. It is very encouraging.

[bleedingheart]

9. There were lots of testimonials about why people were

supporting Dean... and get this a Libertarian and a Republican stood up to say they were with him!

It was really cool..

We also had the extreme luck to have Dean's former college roommate speak!

CMU and Pitt students were in attendance in addition to a wide variety of professionals...

[Cha]

19. We had a former medical school classmate of Dean's there!

And he brought the 1978 album with the picture of Dean as a young medical school student.

It's really great to hear about all these other meetups across the Country when I had been to my own meeting. :-)

[GumboYaYa]

22. How cool to have someone who knew Dean as an ordinary guy

at your Meetup. I get the impression that most people who have known and worked with Dean in the past are very loyal friends. I don't think the Repukes will be able to assasinate Dean's character like their standard MO.

Isn't it great to have the tangible connection to so many other people working to get rid of Bush.

[osaMABUSh]

14. From the 'burgh too but could't go tonight - missed the Boss too!

I live in Cranberry Twp. north of Pgh but family stuff kept me from the meetup. From the Dean website I believe there is another meeting on Dean in the Pgh area (not a meetup) next week. Was it discussed tonight or do you know anything about that?

I also missed another "Democratic get together" tonight - Bruce Springsteen at PNC Park - probably was a fabulous night!

[liberalnurse]

16. Great ! I use to live in Mars.

My sister is in Bridgeville. I have not heard if she went tonight. I'll be out that way soon....

[RamboLiberal]

27. Pittsburgh - I sure wish I could've been there

Been busy on Wed nights the last 3 months. I went to a Meetup in May when it was only 20-25 people. Glad to hear it has grown so tremendously. I'm going to be hyped to go to the next one, and I don't intend on missing any more.

[janx]

10. In Boulder, we had even more new people attending.

Total I guess was 75 or more. I don't live in Boulder, but it's the closest MeetUp. One thing I have realized is that I have to do some more local stuff--even in my neighborhood. I have an acquaintance in the neighborhood whom I've heard is for Dean. So I'm wondering if I shouldn't call her and come up with some ideas we could do together, first just in our subdivision (it isn't huge and it was built in the 70s). From there we could branch out.

I'll be tabling on Pearl Street Mall in Boulder this weekend. Should be a LOT of fun.

[GumboYaYa]

12. I love Boulder.

We were there in January. My sister lives in Fort Collins. That is a great place to get to campaign.

I bet Dean does well in Colorado.

[janx]

28. I hope so. The MeetUp activity in Denver is higher than in Boulder.

And Rollie Heath told us tonight that he hopes Dean will come to Colorado in October.

[Cha]

20. I love Pearl Street Mall! And Boulder in General!

That should be friendly climate for someone like you! :kick:

[janx]

29. It is an EXPENSIVE climate--if you want to live in Boulder.

During the last 15 years or so, it has become a very expensive place to live. Too expensive. As a result, the culture of the place has changed somewhat.

But Pearl Street is still a lot of fun, and there should be a huge collection of tourists, as usual, on Sunday.

[Cha]

30. Yeah! I forget things aren't the same as when I was there!

Let us know how you make out! :-)

[Papillon]

13. I went to a Dean Meet-up in Silverdale, WA

There were over 50 there. It was standing room only. We had people from all age groups, even some high school and college kids.

We all wrote two letters to New Hampshire voters, too and watched the Larry King appearance.

We had a lesbian couple from Vermont who spoke about how different it was for them to live in a state that is more accepting to gays. One of them had surgery and her partner had status as more of a spouse than friend and was able to stay in the hospital room with her during her stay.

I volunteered to be a Dean supporter at the Democratic booth at our upcomming fair. This is the first time I will be doing something like that.

Edit,Dumb typo.

[GumboYaYa]

17. You will have a blast at the fair.

I canvassed at a big festival in St. Louis last weekend. We gave out over 1,000 Dean flyers and got very positive feedback here in the heart of Gep country.

[indigo32]

15. Great...

I was at one of several in the Twin Cities. We were sprawling out of the coffee shop we were in. Definitely plenty of new people there to check it out. It was fun.

[calimary]

23. Standing room only in Santa Monica!

WHOA! I went to a Dean Meetup MONTHS ago and hadn't been able to come to another one til tonight. The first one, almost was canceled for lack of quorum (four), but by the time we'd broken up there were ten of us. Tonight, at a VERY small restaurant on Wilshire Blvd., there had to be 50 or 60 people. You couldn't get through the place. Packed. Lots of enthusiasm. Many people stayed to write letters to New Hampshire!

I took a friend who was curious and had become intrigued by my emails. She took a bunch of flyers and other literature to copy and spread around at her office. She said people were asking her about Dean when they heard she might be going to this. She came away impressed.

Lots of age groups represented. A few elderly, mostly yuppies and 20-somethings and 30-somethings. Lots of people my age and slightly younger (I'm 50). Lots of anecdotal testimonials as the mike was passed around. Lots of people signed up for stuff, asked great questions, and donated money. It was great. Place really got a little overheated with all those bodies crammed in there. They may need a bigger venue next time...

On edit - Almost forgot - there were some GREENS there, too! They said they were converted and were going to vote for Dean.

[Cha]

26. calimary! This is Good to hear! Santa Monica is old Sean

Penn territory before they moved to a more quiet place up North.

We had two men at our meetup in New York whose sons' were former Greens..one was a Green in Minnesota and the other Green was the son of the Medical School classmate of DEan's at Albert Einstein's School of Medicine in New York. Their fathers' related the story with pride. :-)

[calimary]

34. It was good to FEEL and EXPERIENCE, too, zidzi!

Such great enthusiasm in the room. My friend left with a handful of handouts. She appears to have been converted.

Longtime local peace activist Jerry Rubin was there, too. He got up and spoke. Lots of announcements about the strategy to show that Howard Dean is about community - Dean volunteers were encouraged to get together not just to get the word out but to pick up trash, volunteer at soup kitchens, AND - to bring a can of food to the next Dean meetup.

SO cool. Just ALL the right stuff.

What may have made me feel happiest was seeing the makeup of the crowd, while memories stuck in my head - about Will Pitt's recent thread where he was fearful for the future of the liberal and progressive movement because he's only seen the elderly at his events and no young people. Not so at the Gaslite in Santa Monica tonight! MANY just-outta-college types, and young-to-middle-agers. A couple of seniors but most were far younger. We're not dying out - out here! It was so good and encouraging to see. That Will Pitt piece has been stuck in my mind and made me very uneasy. I feel lots better now.

[GumboYaYa]

37. I was encouraged to see the diversity

in St. Louis as well. There were people from all walks of life. The African American attendance was not as strong as I would have liked to see, but we are making inroads. That was a big topic for us, how to reach out to minority communities.

It really is about community and taking our country back. I hope the other candidates can stir their supporters like Dean has. If we all work together, we can become an unstoppable force.

[AnnabelLee]

25. Standing room only in Milwaukee, too

There must have been over 100 people there. We wrote letters, & I & another Dean supporter signed people up to volunteer at community events like Habitat for Humanity, & sorting & packing food for the largest food pantry in the area. We want to show the community that the Dean campaign is about community.:-)

[Cha]

31. Great! "All about Community"! I like that! I'm going to

use that quote and attribute it to a Milwaukee Dean Meetupper! :-)

[opstachuck]

32. ours was too big for the bar here in NYC...

so we had to spill over into another local bar. we were packt like sardines. visions of massive lower manhattan occupation dancing in my head. big events here coming up soon.

[RevolutionStartsNow]

33. Overflow crowd at my Meetup!

And they did a cool thing, which was to take all the new people off to a different part of the room to answer any questions about Dean. The guy answering questions did great.

Meanwhile, the rest of us Meetup veterans spent our time writing letters to New Hampshire Dems.

I was especially impressed with the letter writing "package;" we got a booklet with 2 names and addresses, plus paper, envelope and stamps, a sample letter, and a copied article to include.

We also included a cute picture of my daughter holding a Dean sign (how can they resist?)

Looks like they will be following up on the website to record how many people get responses to their letters. I am constantly amazed at the innovative things that come out of this campaign. Great job!

[Syn_Dem]

35. I'm in St. Louis

And was wondering where the damned thing was?

[GumboYaYa]

36. Last night's was at Bevo Mill on Gravois.

It was kind of hard to find. I got lost on the way home, but I live and work in the U City area so I'm not to familiar with south St. Louis.

Next month we are going to add a location in North St. Louis. We will not be able to accomodate the crowd in the current location.

By chance I sat at a table where everyone there was a U City resident or Wash U student. With all the students coming back in town, I am going to try to set up a U City Meetup also so students can get there easily.

For more info or to find out the events we have going locally go to www.missourifordean.com. We have a local fundraising event on August 15 and Howard is going to call in on a conference call.

We also need help canvassing to reach out to the people wo are not connected to the Internet.

I hope to see you at the next meetup or one of the other many events we have going.