First Time Candidate Butterflies

When I was a candidate many moons ago, I really had a hard time. Didn't like it one bit, being out there like that.

Thanks for posting this.

I hope you enjoyed your experience yesterday, Heather and Rob, and it was really nice meeting you both (I was the women in the blue shirt coordinating check-in volunteers; checked on the procedures for you). I hope you are not so disappointed with the results that you drop out of the party process -- I believe the local Democratic Parties in NC really need new energy within its ranks to change. The Obama campaign has brought many people in -- I just hope some of them stay.

In the 4th District, it was all about name recognition and Durham County. Since the votes are proportioned according to how many votes a county has cast for major Dem candidates in prior years and Wake County has only a portion of its population in the 4th District, Durham definitely had the most votes and the final slate of delegates showed it. But even so, over 100 people ran for a total of six slots and, as a Durham County resident, I was a little amazed that some new faces managed to make it to the final delegation -- but they did.

On the first round, virtually all but the most visible Democratic party activists were eliminated from the ballot -- although we had no mention of any endorsements from the Obamaa campaign at the convention (a few people said they'd been endorsed in emails leading up to it, but I think everyone assumed it was no big deal as the approved list was so long -- in fact, I'm not sure there was a difference in status between being "approved" and being "endorsed" by the Obama campaign, other than the way people presented their approval by the campaign and whether they had requested an official confirmation letter). My understanding Durham was that the Obama campaign approved everyone who applied to be official delegate candidates and that was all most people heard.

But, as can be imagined, with over 100 candidates spread among 275 voting delegates -- only 4 men and 4 women achieved the 20% + 1 threshold of votes needed to make it to the next round of voting. (It was this 20% requirement that made it so difficult for most non-Durham candidates, by the way, without the support of nearly everyone else from every other county, they didn't even have a chance for the next round, where they could have picked up Durham support. One male finalist was the district chair (T.E. Austin), two were county chairs (Kevin Farmer of Durham and Jack Sanders of Orange) and one was a newcomer: Graig Meyer, who helped found TRACTION and has been very active in the Durham Obama campaign. All of these candidates are white and I'm not sure what's up with that. In the end, Austin, Farmer and Myers were chosen and Sanders became the alternate male delegate from District 4 in a separate vote.

On the female delegate side, the first round wiped out most everyone as well. The people who advanced to the final round included two very well-known leaders in the African-American community in Durham -- Cora Cole-McFadden (a Durham City Council member) and Lavonia Allison -- plus Faulkner Fox, who headed up Durham for Obama, and Anita Earls, who is a civil rights attorney probably known to a lot of people in Wake as well as Durham County. Faulkner Fox is a newcomer to recent party politics and she won a delegate spot on the next round, but the three remaining women had to go through another round because none of the remaining candidates got more than 50% of the vote. Cole-McFadden and Earls won handily in the final thrid round of voting, which was a bit of a surprise because Earls is not involved in traditonal party politcs and is a newcomer in that area.

By the way, of any of you are interested: all ballots and vote counts are public knowledge. If you are a Democrat, you have the right to look at them. Just ask your district chair.

I know some of the Orange and Chatham people were disappointed that Durham had so much sway in the delegate selection, and that Wake was frustrated at times, but I hope they were satisfied with the resolutions portion -- I was worried for a bit when the controversial resolutions were pulled from the package, but debate proceeded very smoothly and progressive viewpoints prevailed on those resolutions in the end (choice, anti-immigrant bill, anti-IRV and something else I forget).

To all of you who ran and lost yesterday -- it takes courage to put yourself out there like that. I hope you'll stay involved in the party, consider running for other things, or even run for pubic office as well. We have got to get some new faces into the party and change it from within!

Katy Munger
Durham County

Lead, follow or get out of the way....

We weren't discouraged at all. Given the numbers, we knew it was a crapshoot at best. It was really fun just to try. And frankly, after our first few "pitches" it got much easier and almost fun.

I am strongly thinking about trying my luck at the state convention though. :) See you in New Bern!

http://southernmaledemocrat.com