Top Comments: Campaign Donation Time!

It's five days before the June 30 deadline—as email after phone call assures me, the last reportable deadline before active campaigning begins—and Democratic candidates everywhere are rushing to rope in a huge community of donors so they can report big numbers for Q2. Just since this morning, Al Gore pushed the DCCC,  John Edwards the DSCC (sorry, Al and John—no DCCC or DSCC support while there are FISA-voting blue-dog Dems on the list), Wes Clark wants me to use his ActBlue page to support Obama, seven house and two senate campaigns have emailed me directly, and I've been getting phone calls, too. (I don't ever give or promise money over the phone.) Snailmail is being recycled at an alarming rate.

All this may sound like I'm a scrooge or grinch. I'm not. I'm actually a pretty generous donor. I make a list and check it twice—those FISA aye votes are getting coal this month—get on ActBlue, and donate. No check-writing or filling out forms at each candidate's website: I donate with my credit card, several candidates per donation. It's wonderfully convenient, as you'll see if you jump now.

It was Daily Kos that got me started donating to political candidates in summer 2004. Before then, I was pretty ignorant about who was running where, especially regarding House races. That year, Markos created the Kos 8, which excited so many donors (including myself) that it grew to the Kos Dozen. One of the reasons I stopped lurking and signed up for my account was to cheer the process along—my second comment was urging kos to get those four new candidates for the Kos Dozen rolled out even faster than he was planning.

In 2006, I was far more active, and far more generous. I could recite a distressingly large number of Democratic candidates and their district numbers from memory (Vic Wulsin, OH-02), and seemed to be donating to most of them. I ended up making a spreadsheet to track who I'd donated to and when, because as the election drew closer it was so hard to remember who had gotten the last chunk o' change, and thus who should get the next.

I'm sure you all have your own methods to determine which political candidates get your money. Here's mine:

First I figure out how much I can afford, and write that down somewhere. It's good for a laugh later, when I figure out who I want to donate to and how much I want to donate to each. Somehow, the two numbers never seem to match. Not even close. (Hollow laughter is a specialty chez sardonyx.)

Next, I look at the house and senate races, and figure out which Democratic candidates I want to support, starting with anyone who isn't an incumbent. Incumbents generally have a fundraising advantage, and are less likely to need my help. So I think it's best to check out the newcomers—they'll add to our majority, and I want to support some good liberals and progressives. (I include house members running for the senate in this category, like Tom Allen and Tom Udall: they're going for a new office, and have no incumbency advantage.)

The list of candidates that Markos is supporting is one I pay very close attention to. I generally support the vast majority of them. I'm usually impressed by his candidates...but he limits the number he'll choose, and there just aren't enough races for me.

I read a lot of candidate diaries. A well-written DKos diary can help sway me. A ho-hum diary by a candidate, especially one with spelling errors, will make me leery. Many candidates were added to my list in the 2006 cycle when their supporters were persuasive and well-informed. I'm willing to try long-shots as long as they're working hard. It's a major bonus if they're effectively engaging the netroots—us—and not merely thinking of us as electronic money pots.

This year, I'm looking back at the incumbent Democrats, first-term reps I supported in 2006. The recent FISA vote has helped me winnow out several candidates, far more than I was happy seeing fail us. Mike Arcuri, Kirsten Gillibrand, Patrick Murphy, Nancy Boyda and several more are off my list for the duration. I'm retaining Carol Shea-Porter at the head of my first-termers list, especially as she's eschewing DCCC support (and the strings it comes with), but I'm probably going to continue giving to others who received money in March, such as Paul Hodes in NH, Chris Murphy and Joe Courtney in CT, and John Hall in NY. (Carol and Chris sent me email today.)

I have my March 2008 donation list as a basis. I was out of the country at the time, but it was easy enough to makek an initial list, log on to the internet, cruise over to Daily Kos to remind me of who else was running, figure out who should get my hard-earned bucks, and run up the balance on my credit card on ActBlue. Thirty-five candidates got money from me; I used four ActBlue pages. Blue Majority (now Orange To Blue), Blue America (Firedoglake, Crooks&Liars, Digby, et al.), and a couple of others.

While I'm a reader of many of these sites, I'll use most any respectable-seeming ActBlue page as an aggregator: just find a candidate, and check out the "Who's supporting this candidate" link for ActBlue pages that list that candidate. If they're also supporting a bunch of your other candidates, it can save time. For Carol Shea-Porter, I have a choice of twenty ActBlue pages beyond the individual candidate page I just linked to, and they're all listed on that page. Possible downside: they do get your email address. I got a note from one of these organizations celebrating Donna Edwards taking the oath of office and voting for progressive causes her very first day. They've been restrained (it's my first email from them); you can't guarantee that every pageowner will be so sensible, though mine have been over the past four years.

It's time for me to finish making my list and checking it twice. My money's going in tomorrow.

~~~~~

We all owe a debt to the Kossacks who made their lists regardless of how many times they checked them, and sent in nominations from the past 24 hours in order to highlight great comments made in that period. If you saw any great comments that are not mentioned here—and there are always tens of thousands of comments to choose from—please link to them in your own comments below. The address of that mailbox:

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Anyone can submit deserving comments to our address—the direct link to a comment is available from that comment's date/time—as long as they arrive by 9:30pm Eastern Time. Please always include your Daily Kos user name in the body of your message, so we can credit you properly. Both link and username are important.

cn4st4datrees submitted the following nomination:

gdwtch52 has a beautiful one-liner that speaks volumes, and should be memorized and kept handy for ready retort to anyone who claims we are, should be, or used to be a "Christian nation". From GregMitch's diary Jim Wallis, Evangelical leader, defends Obama vs. Dobson.

From Seneca Doane:

This isn't a popular view on the site, but jennifer poole offers as clear a presentation of what has actually gone on with the FISA vote as I've seen.  People should take a moment to read it and come to grips with it, even if they don't like it.

anotherdemocrat sent:

ksh01 asks, and answers, What do you have to understand when you're used to endless resources? From today's JeffLieber diary, Senator J. Wellington Wimpy.

From brillig:

In USAdaughter's heartfelt I am not sure where to turn..., puredesighee sparks a very involved discussion on racism in the US.

In DarkSyde's lovely The Grand Unified Theory of Conservatism: Idiocracy, kovie describes what his childhood neighborhood thought of conservatives back in the 70's, ending with the same question I have... "What the fuck happened?!?"

SpamNunn writes:

A great picture and a great comment from mediaprof tonight in a girl in MI's IGTNT diary tonight. Abraham Lincoln said this well.  

PS:  The picture made me weep for my own family members buried in Arlington

From your diarist sardonyx:

In Larry Kissell's diary John Edwards was Right, mauro7inf writes a comment entitled Post-American.

In dday's second highly-recommended diary in under 24 hours (see tonight's top mojo list!) Obama campaign finally goes there, accuses McCain of illegal campaign spending, Dallasdoc points out that McCain't has no choice.

Today's top mojo—those comments which have received the highest number of recommendations from Daily Kos users like you—as supplied by sardonyx, using his own revision of the amazing cskendrick's mojo-to-Excel magic.

First, Top Mojo excluding search-identifiable tip jars, first diary comments, and Cheers and Jeers:

  1) That's largely because by LithiumCola — 163
  2) Elder care by radarlady — 151
  3) They didn't "whitewash" him by pundette — 142
  4) Nader's clamoring for attention by dansac — 117
  5) The part where he said two years has past by sweetliberty — 106
  6) Socialism IS NOT Communism! by Hellenic Pagan — 105
  7) The inflation over my lifetime by Rolfyboy6 — 103
  8) You will not be sorry by Dustbowl Observer — 101
  9) "crying wolf" has prevented this war so far. by G2geek — 98
10) People like Dobson make me sick by oscarsmom — 94
11) Wrong. by Rian Fike — 93
12) Great Diary! by Tybalt — 91
13) I disagree. by Craig Hickman — 85
14) US Weekly by kath25 — 83
15) My favorite Carlin Quote: by Lefty Coaster — 82
16) Yeah...get lost, you creepy old boomers by Louise — 76
17) Thanks for diarying this by droogie6655321 — 70
18) Dodd just made the argument by barath — 68
19) dude, ur on the rec list... by rapcetera — 65
20) I Second by jimstaro — 65
21) Oh USAdaughter...you brought me to tears by soms — 64
22) The problem is really with the old-old, by blue jersey mom — 63
23) asdf by droogie6655321 — 63
24) If we replace it, can we replace this diary, too? by homogenius — 63
25) Outstanding! Go Dodd+Feingold! by concerned — 62
26) I dunno by Nina Katarina — 62
27) The analysis is far superior to anything by Muzikal203 — 61
28) Fuck Nader by bam bam — 61
29) Shhh... by NegSpin — 61
30) Well, it could also be by Lisa Lockwood — 60
31) Rightly so. A lot of hard work went into this. by lineatus — 60
32) I'm in for the whole motherfucking $100. by kate mckinnon — 60

Top Mojo with No Exclusions:

  1) tips for the next POTUS by mobilio316 — 564
  2) We're just going to have to brush Nader off by Muzikal203 — 551
  3) tips/recs for a rollin' stone mood... by icebergslim — 442
  4) We're leading 45 to 43 percent by Larry Kissell — 387
  5) tips by dday — 309
  6) tipz by dday — 308
  7) world war 3 might be bad for civil liberties by EmperorHadrian — 307
  8) Tip Jar by Lava20 — 296
  9) Yes by bink — 276
10) I noticed this right away too by Sun dog — 195
11) Good statement by droogie6655321 — 192
12) Took my by surprise. Tips by Lisa Lockwood — 170
13) That's largely because by LithiumCola — 163
14) Elder care by radarlady — 151
15) They didn't "whitewash" him by pundette — 145
16) I got $10 to help replace pdxmikes money by ourhispanicvoices — 122
17) Nader's clamoring for attention by dansac — 117
18) Tip Jar by USAdaughter — 114
19) Socialism IS NOT Communism! by Hellenic Pagan — 107
20) The part where he said two years has past by sweetliberty — 106
21) The inflation over my lifetime by Rolfyboy6 — 103
22) You will not be sorry by Dustbowl Observer — 103
23) "crying wolf" has prevented this war so far. by G2geek — 98
24) Thank you for your diary- please put up a tip jar by Judgment at Nuremberg — 98
25) People like Dobson make me sick by oscarsmom — 94
26) Wrong. by Rian Fike — 93
27) Great Diary! by Tybalt — 91
28) Tips for moral support? by ThatPoshGirl — 87
29) I disagree. by Craig Hickman — 85
30) US Weekly by kath25 — 83

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