I decided to ask the Democrats in my precinct their opinion.

[crispini]

Since, as someone else mentioned in this forum, we're going to the state convention as REPRESENTATIVES of our precinct, why not ask the people we are supposed to be representing what they think? So I cooked up a quick and dirty survey to send out to the 80 or so people from my precinct on my email list. I realize it's hardly representative of EVERYBODY but it's a start. Here it is, feel free to steal it to send out to your precinct if you wish! I'll report results soon.

Hi all,
It has been brought to my attention that when I and the three other delegates from our precinct go to the state convention on June 8 and 9th, we are really going as representatives of our precinct. So, I would like to ask the folks on this email list their opinions about the things we will be voting on (the TDP Chair is the biggest) and the direction of the Texas Democratic Party. (I realize that I'm not going to be able to talk to the WHOLE precinct this way, but it's a start.)

If you are interested in giving us some feedback, hit reply, make sure MY name is in the reply-to box [e-mail] and answer these questions or any other that you feel like. If you want to talk about any of these issues I am always available at xxx.xxx.xxxx

There is no one clearinghouse source I have found for information about the TDP chair race but here are a couple of good places to look:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=180

http://www.burntorangereport.com/frontPage.do

Thanks!


1. Who do you favor for chair of the Texas Democratic Party?

___ Boyd Richie
___ Glen Maxey
___ Charlie Urbina Jones
___ Lakesha Rogers
___ No opinion

2. What is your opinion of the job the TDP is doing in the following areas?

* Candidate recruitment
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Communication
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Fundraising
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Website
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

3. Are you a sustaining member of the TDP?
___ yes
___ no

4. Did you vote in the Democratic primary this year?
___ yes
___ no

4a. Why / why not?



5. Freestyle! Any other thoughts / ideas / etc....?

[johncoby2]

1. Hum....lets answer some of these ourselves

1. Who do you favor for chair of the Texas Democratic Party?
___ Boyd Richie
___ Glen Maxey


2. What is your opinion of the job the TDP is doing in the following areas?
* Candidate recruitment
___ poor


* Communication
___ poor


* Fundraising
___ fair

* Website
___ fair

3. Are you a sustaining member of the TDP?
___ yes

4. Did you vote in the Democratic primary this year?
___ yes

4a. Why / why not?

5. Freestyle! Any other thoughts / ideas / etc....?
The Party needs some excitement to attract people. It is hard work and we need to have lots of fun to help offset this.

The party has done a horrible job of recruiting candidates. First they need to teach people how to determine IF they should run in the first place. Second, once they decide, they should understand up front what kind of support they will get from the party. Lets admit it, we dont have the resources to flood EVERY candidate with either money or support. The party has to pick and choose based upon the candidate and the race.

We have some candidates that should NOT be running at all because they are not qualified, have no money, or have no idea of what government can or should do. This doesnt help the party as a whole or the people of Texas. God bless them for running, but they need to do something else with their energy. I have a number of examples of this problem. Running for office is not a game. It is serious and will require time, money, committment, especially from volunteers.

[Suttree]

2. Tx Dems

1. Who do you favor for chair of the Texas Democratic Party?
___ Charlie Urbina Jones


2. What is your opinion of the job the TDP is doing in the following areas?

* Candidate recruitment
___ poor

* Communication
___ extremely poor

* Fundraising
___ extremely poor


* Website
___ fair


3. Are you a sustaining member of the TDP?
___ no


4. Did you vote in the Democratic primary this year?
___ no

4a. Why / why not?
I wished to sign a petition for an independent candidate for Governor.



5. Freestyle! Any other thoughts / ideas / etc....?

Stop going negative! It will not work, especially in Texas. Come up with some new ideas and work from there, but Texans will not vote with negativity. It's too impolite.

[johncoby2]

8. You signed a petition for an independent?

Then you are NOT a Democrat. Your opinion in this poll really doesnt matter.

Go work for your independent candidate.

[derby378]

10. Welcome to DU, but PLEASE say it ain't so...

You didn't really fall for Kinky's siren song, did you? He's a conservative deep down inside, like Strayhorn and Perry.

You had a chance to negate that signature on Kinky's petition by voting in the Radnofsky/Kelly runoff in April. If you didn't, it's too late - you're stuck until November.

[PDittie]

3. Here's the poll results from those calls a few weeks ago:

from BOR:

http://www.burntorangereport.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=935

Last week, you may have been contacted by a research firm hired by the Glen Maxey Campaign to conduct a phone survey of delegates. Among delegates that have made up their mind, Glen Maxey is firmly in the lead. However, the majority of delegates remain undecided. Both Maxey and Richie begin the race with a sizable base. Glen Maxey's base is larger, and he leads in all urban areas and most rural parts of Texas.

LSI Phone Survey N=1168
Maxey 24.9%
Richie 13.4%
Jones 2.6%
Und 59.1%

No surprises in these numbers, in my humble O. Not even the apparent and obvious weakness of Boyd Richie's support.

But delegates polled don't represent delegation strength to a predictable degree, and no poll can measure the party machinery's pressure for their choice -- applied to, and through to the delegations, by the incumbent SDEC members who have known Boyd for decades and will stick together for him. I find this somewhat comical, since we'll actually get to see with our own eyes how much these folks can/will do relative to actual politicking -- with their collective reputation of doing 'nothing'.

And younger delegates are under-represented in the polling, as only land lines were dialed, not cell numbers. I suspicion that delegates with only cell numbers are likely to support Maxey.

One last personal tidbit: my wife took this call and responded "undecided, but leaning to Maxey", so I do not know where our two votes fall in that poll. But since Glen did the polling, I can guess. ;)

Disclosure: I remain "publicly" uncommitted (but likely to cast a vote in the first round for Charlie just to see where the true strength of each candidate lies). Since it's a four-way race and the winner has to have 50% plus one, the real race is to make the runoff Saturday evening. At least Diebold isn't doing the counting. (Who does count the votes, by the way?)

Conclusion: There's going to be some blood-letting in Fort Worth.

And the cold hard truth: Our statewide ballot candidates are going to have to get elected without the state party's help -- as DVO has already cogently pointed out in another thread -- because it will remain profoundly dysfunctional following the blood-letting.

So the practical conclusion remains that the Texas Democratic Party will be largely irrelevant to our success in the fall elections. Whoever gets elected in June isn't going to be able to make a dime's worth of difference in November because they won't have the money and they won't have the unity.

Which means to me that we're going to have to work our asses off for our campaign(s) anyway and that IMHO it's best to dispense with complaining about "the little office on Rio Grande", as one of my favorite pontificators who isn't named David puts it.

[crispini]

4. Yeah, in the fall, I agree ...

but for 2008, wouldn't it be nice to have some real help?

[PDittie]

5. We won't make it to 2008

if we don't get some Democrats elected in 2006. Just sayin' ...

[derby378]

16. Agreed

2006 is when we draw the line in the sand, just like at the Alamo. Only this time around, I'm hoping the defenders have a little surprise in store for our modern-day Santa Anna.

[Son of Bentsen]

7. Far Too Sad

I think the party can mean a lot more than you suggest. Just because it's always sucked doesn't mean that it always has to. One reason I am leaning toward Maxey or Jones is because they want to get down to business immediatly, instead of the Boyd Ricie plan of talk, talk, talk.

It'll be a fun deal no matter what!

[TexasThoughtCriminal]

6. Excellent idea to poll your precinct!

I doubt your average Dem voter would have the foggiest opinion of the TDP chair race, but it plants the race and those names in their minds. If they read the two-paragraph story buried on page 29 of the DMN reporting the result, they will remember your poll. But even more important, they will remember your name and that they have a precinct chair who cares about their opinion.
:yourock:

<On second thought, maybe I'm being a bit optimistic that the DMN will report on the chair race...>

[crispini]

9. Well, nobody's had an opinion yet.

But, as TTC said, hey, part of the point here was just me asking. :P

[crispini]

11. I got a response to my survey!

Since I don't have anyone to give it to I figure I'll post it here along with ya'lls responses. :) I like the way this guy thinks. Maybe I will forward it to my SDEC representative.

1. Who do you favor for chair of the Texas Democratic Party?

___ Boyd Richie
___ Glen Maxey
___ Charlie Urbina Jones
___ Lakesha Rogers
___ No opinion

2. What is your opinion of the job the TDP is doing in the following areas?

* Candidate recruitment

___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
__X_ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Communication
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
__X_ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Fundraising

___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
_X__ no opinion

* Website

___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
_X__ no opinion

3. Are you a sustaining member of the TDP?

___ yes
_X__ no

4. Did you vote in the Democratic primary this year?

_X__ yes
___ no

4a. Why / why not?

Because of a refusal to consider the other candidates in the other party.


5. Freestyle! Any other thoughts / ideas / etc....?

What everybody out here in the hinterlands is waiting for is for a party to follow, guided and represented by people who are leaders. We don’t want to know all the bad things that others in other parties have done in the time they have been in office; we get enough of that all the time. Jumping on every mistake, misjudgment, misguided or corrupt action of others doesn’t give us a damn thing to think about that is positive.


Clearly stated, simple and coherent positions on the most important issues we face locally through nationally, presented by people that have worked in their lives, who don’t represent some special interest, who are not corrupted by the process that got them to the position they are in; who are not afraid to speak what they believe is true, even if it is not necessarily what I might do or think and who can present their position in a straightforward and simple manner. Keep the damn sizzle, I want some steak!!!!!!!

[TexasThoughtCriminal]

12. Wow, looks like you have a real, live, thinking Dem in your precinct

You need to recruit this one to activism. Since this one wants some steak, I suggest inviting him/her to the next DVO speaking engagement in Dallas!

[StellaBlue]

13. .

1. Who do you favor for chair of the Texas Democratic Party?

___ Boyd Richie
___ Glen Maxey
___ Charlie Urbina Jones
___ Lakesha Rogers
_X_ No opinion

2. What is your opinion of the job the TDP is doing in the following areas?

* Candidate recruitment
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
_X_ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Communication
___ excellent
___ good
___ fair
___ poor
Xextremely poor
___ no opinion

* Fundraising
___ excellent
___ good
_X_ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

* Website
___ excellent
___ good
_X_ fair
___ poor
___ extremely poor
___ no opinion

3. Are you a sustaining member of the TDP?
___ yes
_X_ no

4. Did you vote in the Democratic primary this year?
_X_ yes
___ no

4a. Why / why not?
Wanted to vote for Barbara Radnofsky


5. Freestyle! Any other thoughts / ideas / etc....?

[redqueen]

14. wow thanks... love it!

:thumbsup:

[Melissa G]

15. Thanks for this opportunity to rant, crispini....

1. Who do you favor for chair of the Texas Democratic Party?


___ Glen Maxey
___ Charlie Urbina Jones


2. What is your opinion of the job the TDP is doing in the following areas?

* Candidate recruitment
_X_ poor

* Communication
___ poor


* Fundraising
_X_ fair


* Website

_X_ fair


3. Are you a sustaining member of the TDP?

_X_ no

4. Did you vote in the Democratic primary this year?
_X_ yes

4a. Why / why not?
Because I like to be part of the solution! Because I like to loudly complain about what is Not working and Cheer about what is.. I'm ready to do some cheering as soon as possible...


5. Freestyle! Any other thoughts / ideas / etc....?
We need to get off our Behinds as a party and train us some minority leadership. Texas has recently become a minority /majority state and how white does our leadership look?? very. I like Glen but given how I feel about the need for minority leadership I will have a big wrestle with my conscience voting for him over Jones the first time around.

The other MOST IMPORTANT point is who has a team making sure our votes are being accurately counted and making Damn Sure we are not being disenfranchised?
All of us bust butt to get folks to the polls. The TDP should be actively working to make sure those voters are really registered and that votes are actually being accurately recorded, tabulated and reported! No Lies about slush funds for 10,000 lawyers ready to go who never show up.. No promises of fighting for votes and then quickly conceding... (do I sound still peeved about this...well ,yes I am...)I want an active TDP making sure our winning candidates take office!