{"id":1228,"date":"2007-02-07T09:07:00","date_gmt":"2007-02-07T15:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/02\/first-grassroots-richardson-meet-up-day-sees-some-success-but-organizers-have-a-lot-of-work-to-do\/"},"modified":"2007-02-07T09:07:00","modified_gmt":"2007-02-07T15:07:00","slug":"first-grassroots-richardson-meet-up-day-sees-some-success-but-organizers-have-a-lot-of-work-to-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/02\/first-grassroots-richardson-meet-up-day-sees-some-success-but-organizers-have-a-lot-of-work-to-do\/","title":{"rendered":"First grassroots Richardson meet-up day sees some success, but organizers have a lot of work to do"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s first national grassroots meet-up day, organized via the Internet by volunteers not affiliated with his presidential campaign, saw success in some states and revealed in others that there\u2019s a lot of work to do. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In Boston<\/st1:city>, more than 100 people turned out at an event organized by Jeff Gulko, a former Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> staffer in the U.S. Department of Energy. In Minneapolis<\/st1:city>, Minn.<\/st1:state><\/st1:place>, a group also had high turnout.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

But in Olympia<\/st1:city> Washington<\/st1:state><\/st1:place>, despite an article<\/a> in the local newspaper promoting the event, only four people showed, said organizer Ken Camp.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Camp and Emmett O’Connell, the two Olympia<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> organizers who have been doing a lot of national organizing for the grassroots group, will focus primarily on their state in the future, Camp said, and let others focus on the national organizing.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

They\u2019ve set March 6 as their next meeting date, and brainstormed on Tuesday night ways \u201cwe will reach out to our community and spread the word about the governor,\u201d Camp said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Leaders of several local groups spent more than 30 minutes on a conference call with Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> on Tuesday night. It was an example of how a candidate can use the Internet and other communication means to their fullest.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Here were a group of grassroots supporters, who organized across the nation via the Internet, speaking on a conference call with their candidate, and the entire event didn\u2019t cost the Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> campaign any money. Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> pledged to make time to speak with the grassroots organizers approximately every two weeks.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI want to thank you for your support,\u201d Richardson<\/st1:city><\/st1:place> told the group.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> said donations to his campaign through the grassroots network\u2019s site, americaforrichardson.org<\/a>, have topped $10,000.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

He also spoke of his success at last weekend\u2019s Democratic National Committee winter meeting. His speech so impressed pundits that he is now being placed by some in the top tier of candidates alongside Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

But, Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> said, he still won\u2019t be able to raise the money the other top candidates have. He said he will beat them by outworking them.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to need your guys\u2019 help to spread the word and build on the tremendous momentum,\u201d Richardson<\/st1:city><\/st1:place> told the group.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

During the call, Richardson<\/st1:city> answered questions about his candidacy and his views on the Iraq<\/st1:place><\/st1:country-region> war, immigration, education and other issues.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Even the conference call was not without its bugs. It was, to some degree, disorganized, and each time Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> finished answering a question, a free-for-all erupted as others fought to be the next to ask a question.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

And, just as I was able to get my hands on the phone number and code to listen in on the conference call, so was a man from Nevada who doesn\u2019t want Richardson to be elected president.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The man didn\u2019t identify himself by name, but claimed he was a military veteran and said Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> \u201cstole my dog tags.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Richardson<\/st1:city><\/st1:place> was still on the call during the man\u2019s first rant, but Gulko quickly moved to another question. Immediately after Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> got off the call, the man began a second rant. Others tried to tell him they didn\u2019t believe Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> would steal his dog tags, and he yelled. Some told him to get off the call, and he barked back at them.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI am not going to be disconnected,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m going to work against him.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Those who were still on the call then discussed ways to prevent such ambushes on future calls. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s first national grassroots meet-up day, organized via the Internet by volunteers not affiliated with his presidential campaign, saw success in some states and revealed in others that there\u2019s a lot of work to do. In Boston, more than 100 people turned out at an event organized by Jeff Gulko, a former Richardson […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1228\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}