Progress Illinois editor Josh Kalven was in Austin, TX for the third annual Netroots Nation -- a convention of progressive bloggers, activists, and politicians held in mid-July. Keynote speakers included House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas, Lawrence Lessig, Van Jones -- and by surprise, former Vice President Al Gore. Following are some video highlights.
Josh interviews 10th District congressional candidate Dan Seals:
Josh interviews 13th District congresional candidate Scott Harper:
During the "Future Leaders" panel, Seals says congressional Democrats "caved" by supporting the recent Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act legislation:
And here's Seals commenting on Rep. Mark Kirk during the same panel:
On Saturday, several members of the Obama campaign sat on a panel titled: "Organizing for Change: An Inside Look at Obama For America's Grassroots Strategy." The discussion was moderated by new media director Joe Rospars and featured deputy campaign manager Steve Hildebrand, Ohio general election director Jeremy Bird, and Georgia deputy field director Joy Cushman. Of all the panels I attended at Netroots Nation, this was clearly one of the more newsworthy, as it's quite rare that you get to hear directly from the organizers and field operatives -- the real backbone of the campaign and the key to Obama's primary success.
The video below shows Bird describing his experiences organizing for Obama in South Carolina, where he served as field director during the primary.
Here's the first part of Bird's presentation:
Here's the brief video shown during the event:
And back to Bird, who tells a fascinating story about a 37-year-old Obama volunteer in Florence, SC who decided to try to unseat a long-time mayoral incumbent using the campaign infrastructure left in place after the presidential primary. He won by a single vote:
Here's Cushman describing her path into organizing and providing some more detail about the thinking behind the campaign's Organizing Fellows program:
Following her talk, the panel played this video profile of an organizing fellow stationed in Ohio:
Hildebrand made some news at the panel by announcing tentative plans for a "massive" three-day voter registration drive to be held around Labor Day:
