March Meetup:

A quick report on our March meeting at the School for International Training. We had the extraordinary privilege of having two Democratic party leaders join around thirty of us. Ray Buckley has taken on among many other responsibilities the vice-chair of the Northeastern Region of the country, which interestingly enough includes New England, the Middle Atlantic, islands in the Caribbean, and Democrats living abroad world wide. His political roots and many of his activities are in Manchester, NH. Peter Mallary, after a varied career in Vermont state government and serving the Democratic party, is now its chair. Their discussion and insights were fascinating, and we greatly enjoyed their company. I can't cover all the topics they did here and keep this brief, but I will summarize by saying that they report that the Democratic National Committee is excited by its new chief. Gov. Dean is the first openly elected chair of the DNC in some time (President's typically designate who will be the chair of their party as Clinton did.) As we know, Dean's passion is to build the party from the grassroots up (as the Republicans have done in recent years and the DNC has not). The parties in both NH and VT are working hard to do this, getting their voter lists together, organizing volunteers and committees, etc. It is a national effort which Dean started out with the significant request that each state party submit a five year plan indicating where it wants to be in 2010 and specifically how it plans to get there. Communication within the party is to be a major focus, and both our guests are very involved in finding ways to improve it. The meetup had many questions and the discussion was wide-ranging and lively. We were all very appreciative of our guests' having come so far on a winter night.
Andy Burrows, Democracy for America Keene/Brattleboro co-host (VT)


One of the important comments of the evening was that many of us on the left have fallen asleep at the switch, and are not entirely aware of the extreme danger our country is in at the hands of the right wing. We helped make changes over the years, but those changes are now being eroded. It is the grassroots that can change that by participating within our community in small but significant ways. Meetup is one of the ways we empower ourselves, by staying in touch with our community and events. "Think globally, act locally" is really relevant now and you are the ones that can do that just by participating at our local level. Please join us.
We're it, it's up to us!
Julia Ferrari, Democracy for America Keene/Brattleboro/& Ashuelot co-host (NH),
(Democracy for NH organizing member)

Our April meeting will be the first Wednesday of the month (April 6) at 7 pm at Bickfords in Brattleboro VT (just over the river from NH). For regular info sign up at meetup.com
Our Ashuelot DFA meetup joins with the Keene/Brattleboro meetup.