Hurrah for us on leaving Facebook. Time to help others do so as well. It may seem impossible, but if you want to see how seemingly impossible social change is done, look at Hochschild’s book Bury the Chains where he points out that when the abolitionists started their campaign, slavery was as central to the British economy as cars are to ours. Replace the word cars with Facebook. We can break the chains.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/10/10/1891571/-How-to-create-the-Great-Facebook-Migration?utm_campaign=trending

We covered many topics at our meeting yesterday and Jeff will be posting complete notes soon, with info about how to contact the New York Times about weak both-siderism reporting complete with some Andy verbiage, how to avoid feeding the Fox beast and more. Meanwhile, our final Virginia fund-raising thermometer is posted and I wanted to report we FINISHED all the postcards. It means a great deal to me that we gather together to encourage each other in the face of the evils we are fighting. Thanks so much and onward!

We have serious postcarding to do for Virginia, discussion about how to support the Democrats during the impeachment proceedings (and educate ourselves as per Andy’s post) and some talk about how to move forward with endorsements. Lots to talk about and do.

Thanks to all of you who dropped off postcards while Andy and I returned once more to DC. We are looking forward to seeing many of you at our next meeting this Sunday, Sept 22, 4:30-5:45 at our house. We have been given a fairly complicated postcarding task for Virginia. We will go over in some detail at the meeting as well as educate ourselves about voter suppression. Please bring any info you all have about the best groups fighting voter suppression.

I am happy to report that we reached our goal of $2,000 for our three Virginia candidates. Everyone is still welcome to spread the link around and gather more donations. Our candidates are counting on us.

1. Thanks to Noemi for a very helpful posting on postcards (just below). It is time to get those pens out and writing again.
2. Our next meeting is this coming Sunday Sept. 8, 3:30-4:45 at our house.
3. At our meeting we will have some educational presentations about how to fight gerrymandering. Bring all your questions.
4. We will also do a last set of postcards for Virginia.
5. Finally, we will work on our plans for upcoming events, including a fund-raiser for Lauren Underwood.
6. This should be a very interesting event.

Rock the Congress
Saturday, September 7, 8:30 am – 4:30 pm
Berkeley City College, 2050 Center St., Berkeley
Events engage new and experienced activists and facilitate collaboration among progressive grassroots group leaders to win elections. Rock the Congress is a Super PAC whose mission is to maximize collaboration among progressive groups to win elections.
No one will be turned away due to lack of funds. If the ticket fee represents a hardship for you, please submit a request for sponsorship here.

We resume action this Sunday, August 25th 4:30-5:45 at our house. Lots to organize for fall action. Looking forward to seeing everyone again.

1. Can someone volunteer to shepherd the Origami event forward while we are out of town? When we return it will already be August 18th.
2. For those of you who want to stop by, we are sitting Shiva for Andy’s father this Wednesday evening from 7:00-9:00 pm at our house.

Andy’s father died early this morning so we are in Washington DC and therefore have to cancel the meeting set for tomorrow, Sunday July 28th. We will be sitting shiva one night this week and will let everyone know when it is set. Luckily we have some time before our event in August to prepare. Naomi

During this stressful and depressing week, let’s try to keep our eye on the prizes:

1. The Virginia election. Please continue to pass around our ActBlue link to family and friends.
2. We will shortly be sending out a sign-up link for the Origami lesson with Ann Overton and sale of Janet Grodin’s prints on Saturday August 24th 1:30-5:00 so tell your friends about it.
3. Next meeting is this coming Sunday, July 28, 4:30-5:45 at our house. We will talk about gerrymandering and also new apps to entice young people to vote, as well as finalizing the plans for August 24th.
4. Meanwhile, here are some action items: A) Tony the Democrat has a good post with the results of a study about postcards and their study found: Sending handwritten postcards to voters definitely had a noticeable effect on Vote by Mail signups among Pasco Democrats. Now it is time to do the same for Florida. Just log on to poscardstovoters.org. B) Make a small donation to help the re-enfranchised voters in Florida pay the poll-taxes that are being used to keep them from voting: wegotthevote.org and C) Need some friends and snack to get those postcard and letters writings vibes back in action? Join with other writers on Saturday July 27th 3:00-5:00 at Ellen’s House, 20 Jerome St. in Piedmont.

Thanks for a fun and productive meeting everyone.

1. We are more than half way to reaching our $2,000 goal to support “our” three races in Virginia this November (our Quiet Evening at Home brought in $1,200 in the end!). Everyone can watch our progress on the thermometer Andy is pinning at the top of our site and can encourage friends and family to contribute.
2. To help reach our goal we are planning a special event at the Grodin’s on Saturday August 24th with two parts, first an Origami lesson led by Anne Overton with refreshments (1:00-3:30, limited to 20) and then a sale of original prints created and donated by Janet Grodin (3:30-5:00, everyone welcome). We will put together an invite for everyone to send to their friends and a list of tasks for the event.
3. Jane was out canvassing for Harder on Saturday and told us about the improved democratic party app –which has some glitches. Good for her for being a test case for fixing it!
4. Bruce asked if we are ready to sign our group up as an official participants in the next stage of Indivisible planning and events, (starting in September) and we gave him the official OK. Bruce also gave us the results from a survey done after the debate and he will post them as one of his Thursday posting. Indivisible is not going to endorse in the primary (at least not for the foreseeable future).
5. We gave out postcards with our new logo. Those who need addresses and can’t get them on their own, email me. Time to start those pens flowing again.
6. At our next meeting we are going to finalize our plans for our August 24th event and then discuss 1) which groups are doing good jobs fighting gerrymandering and deserve our support and 2) I will share the new app I have been encouraging students to download which has info about where/when to vote and also gives the voting records of the your contacts. We started a lively conversation about the pros and cons of this type of app and will continue it next meeting.
7. Our next meeting is in two weeks July 28th, 4:30-5:45. NOTE: The following meeting will not be until Sunday August 25th (due to our family vacation).