We spent time writing letters. Many letters. Many races.

Link for Grandmothers for a Brighter Future.

Our acquaintances fall on both sides of Berkeley Measure L (bonds). Here is part of an email for a Town Hall in favor of L. (Yes, that is tomorrow.)

Please join us for a Town Hall Wednesday, October 12 7:00 – 8:30 PM – BY ZOOM To Learn About Measure L RSVP by Clicking HERE Measure L is a Bond Measure to Renew Berkeley

We will be at College and Ashby on Friday, October 14, at 4:00 to hawk our Defend Democracy yard signs.

Note, I have recorded money given to me for signs from Bruce and Jane. There are two of you whose donations I missed; please let me know who you are.

Usual place, usual suspects.

We have signs for sale!

Usual place. As I mentioned before, we will have special guests by Zoom. We will, of course, put them up on a screen here, but anyone who doesn’t plan on attending in person can watch with this link. Please join this a few minutes’ early: to prevent any embarrassing Zoom-bombing, you won’t be admitted until I can approve that we know you. (The Zoom part of the meeting will start at 4:30.)

Any friends who may want to donate… the link is above.

Let me also mention that Mandela Barnes is the only 50/50-or-better Democratic Senate candidate with fundraising woes. The Republican SuperPACs are coming to rescue Ron Johnson, if they can; they are cutting their losses by conceding Arizona and redirecting the ad money.

The signs have arrived.

Bruce says the CA Dem Party has young liaisons with Indivisible full of energy.

We will have a Zoom link for the Michigan session at the next meeting. Those of you unable to come to the physical meeting chez nous, will have to register to get it, so we don’t have any Zoom accidents. (I’ll post the registration link when I get it.)

By the way, on the list of who doesn’t need our money although she is great, I see that Katie Porter (CA–47) finished June with a mere $19 million on hand. Her opponent had a little over $1 million.

Judy Stacey sent me a link to today’s Debbie Downer NY Times story. The premise: take the error in Biden’s favor in the 2020 election and apply it to the 202 Senate race. We know there were some big misses in 2020 polling and not in our favor, either.

If you do that, Warnock (GA) and Cortez Masto (NV) are barely holding on, Mandela Barnes (WI) is well behind, and Val Demings (FL) is trailing by double-digits, which I suggest is absurd.

Once you get past this terrifying tableau, they start to discuss why the premise may not hold at all. And then we come to the important part: Dems have outperformed their pre-election polls in every special election since the Dobbs decision. The big polling misses come from not understanding who is coming to vote. There’s evidence that who is coming to vote this November will be younger and more female than usual. And that’s why we should be optimistic.

It’s been 21 years since the Towers came down.

We will have a special guest appearing by Zoom at the 9/25 meeting. Our hard work on fundraising has not gone unnoticed.

We blew past our original goal of $2,500 on to $7,000 and are on our way to $8,000. Great work everyone. Don’t stop now– send around our link to all your friends and if you need help with a Giving Circle email, let us know. On to $10,000!

As I indicated Sunday, Palin needed over 60% (apparently 66%, after the first round was fully tallied) of Begich second-choice votes. In the event, Palin got just over 50%, not enough, with the remainder split about evenly between Peltola (28%) and Blank/Invalid (21%). Yet another Democratic overperformance.

UPDATE: Representative Peltola and I share a birthday 16 years apart. And it is today.

We welcomed two new members, Judy Gumbo and Arthur Eckstein. I’ve put in the links to make it easy for the FBI, if they are reading the Indivisible Elmwood blog. The more readers, the better.

My usual election and poll results rundown was a little brighter than earlier in the year. Our postcards pulled Pat Ryan over the finish line in NY-19. The AK-AL special election, which uses Ranked Choice, may be a big upset. The Democrat, Mary Peltola, is leading the field in first-choice votes. Sarah Palin is second. Mainstream Republican Nick Begich is third. The question is what number of Begich voters put Palin as a second choice—even a blank or invalid second choice would be good for Peltola. Every election since Dobbs has shown Democratic overperformance relative to expectations, polls, and even Biden 2020.

Our ActBlue site remains devoted to three grassroots/statehouse campaigns: North Carolina, Michigan, and Arizona. Michigan and Arizona have exceptionally bad MAGA lunatics running for statewide office.

Bruce brought in an order form for Defend Democracy yard signs. I have contacted the printer and we will finalize an order for 50, shipped to our house.

I was asked to see which close-race Senate candidates, if any, need money. Most of the key races, the candidate is well-resourced. The one furthest behind his opponent is Mandela Barnes, in WI-Sen. Barnes was the only one with a competitive primary (although in the end his opponents all dropped out) which somewhat depleted his resources.

And we discussed whether and where to canvass. Naomi and I keep talking about Dr. Kermit Jones (CA–03), partly because he seems like a great dark horse possibility, partly because his district is not that far away and not as scorching-hot as the Central Valley.

Tuesday’s special elections give us hope.

White House social media scorches Republicans. More like this please.

Surprise positive election upset possibility. No spoilers.