37 Days

Solon Area Democrats got together for a meet the candidates event on Sept. 28 at the Solon Public Library. The room was packed. Eight candidates and elected officials spoke, then we broke the group for one-on-one conversations between candidates and voters. We could feel the energy in the room.

Our featured speaker was congressional candidate Christina Bohannan, who has been rising in the polls. We have a distance to go to elect her, yet it seems possible this cycle. The aforementioned energy will hopefully carry her across the finish line.

Most notable about the event was the reunion of many area people who worked on previous campaigns, including a nonagenarian whose first political campaigning was for the Adlai Stevenson. She wasn’t the only nonagenarian present. It was good to see old friends again. The point of the day was to kick off the final push into the November 5 election. This group has been activated. What will they do?

I scheduled a door-knocking event in the afternoon but it was a bust due to lack of volunteers. The house and state senate candidates from my district took a walk list. I did too. That was it. While in person voter contact can be a positive motivator, that contact will have to come from other places this cycle. It will come from the 65+ people who attended our event. The method will be word of mouth among family and friends about the importance of this election.

In a recent post, I suggested there is a new way to canvass, and based on Saturday’s experience, that is both likely and correct. The number of doors a campaign knocks is no longer a meaningful metric. How deeply we penetrate social networks matters so much more.

37 days from the election there is excitement among Democrats. One hopes we will make some gains in closing the gap between us and the Republican majority this cycle. At minimum, we should be able to break the Republican super majority in the state senate and increase the number of Democratic state representatives. There is no time for analytics. We must continue to do two or three things each day to elect Democrats. That is how we will win and move forward.