I must say, I really appreciate snow bored's comments about Do-ers and Transients. His four types of bathers matches some of my thoughts about the types of citizens.

In my view, there are:

Citizens who are not registered.
Citizens who are registered, but don't vote.
People who vote, but don't donate or volunteer.
Volunteers and Donors, who don't run for office.
and
Candidates.

It is a lot of work to move a person from one level to the next. We saw lots of voter registration drives this year. However, newly registered voters are the least likely to get out and vote. They need prodding, they need help.

Once a person starts voting, they usually keep voting. That is one reason why GOTV efforts focus on people who have voted in the previous elections.

When Dean came along, got a lot of people to move from being just voters, to being donors. In a lot of ways, he took what political fundraisers considered "transients", people who vote, but don't donate, and made them "Do-ers", people that donate. Before he did this, most people didn't believe that many of these "transients" could be turned into "Do-ers". Yet, like voting, once a person starts donating to campaigns. They are likely to keep at it. Many of the people who donated to my wife's campaign were donating to second campaign they ever donated to. The first campaign they donated to, being of course, Howard's.

Likewise, through the efforts like the Dean Dozen, Gov. Dean took Volunteers and Donors and made them into candidates. Again, once you get someone to run, you will have much better luck getting them to run again. For us, the question isn't if Kim will run again, it is what campaign will she take on next.

With that, I want to come back to some of what snow bored talked about. Volunteering for Gov. Dean's 2004 Presidential campaign was a lot of work. It was also a lot of fun. Fun is contagious. People want to have fun. I think there is even a song about that.

If you think volunteering is hard work, but also fun, you should try running for office. That was exhausting. Yet it was also great fun.

On several mailing lists that I am on, there is a tenor of defeat. You can't get "transients" to become "Do-ers". The Democratic Party is too messed up to try and fix. Liberals don't get any respect. etc. etc. etc.

There are certain people that always have this negative tone. They might as well be working for Rove. I'm now blocking emails from several of them.

During the Dean's 2004 Presidential campaign, many people quoted Gandhi: "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." However, many of them overlook how long and hard Gandhi's fight was.

Gandhi's fight is our fight. It is a fight for caring for our fellow human beings, and the includes encouraging even those who are half-castes, Samaritans, down-trodden, or just plain defeatists.

Aldon
"Let not the hope of the poor be taken away"