"How are we going to raise money for the candidates?" A request for clarity...

Hi everyone,

What follows is the text of an e-mail exchange that Manny Fishman and I thought might be useful for everyone.

Thanks,

Jeff Anderson

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Question from Manny:

Hey, Jeff. I want to encourage you to post a blog entry on the question that was asked Friday night: How are we going to raise money for the candidate(s)?

I think you were vague in the answer at the Richardson event. Is the purpose of WWH08 just to plug us into a campaign and raise money for a campaign - as we desire? Or based on the caucus, do we as a group do fundraising collectively for a candidate? Are we a political force or just a conduit to get people plugged in? I think you should post something that tells people what you/the hosts hope will come out of this, fundraising wise.

Answer from Jeff:

In a nutshell, WWH08 is simply a conduit for getting people involved. It is not a political force. In fact, by design, there is no legal organization here. This is the political and legal equivalent of a book club. All of the campaigns have been told that this is a self organized group of fundraisers (of various levels), community leaders, and opinion leaders who are:

1) uncommitted to any candidate
2) plan on being involved in a personally meaningful way in the '08 race
3) want to make an informed decision about who to support and therefore will not endorse any candidate before the series has concluded.

At the end of the caucus everyone will be able to declare for whichever candidate they wish and jump into their campaigns in whatever manner they choose (or not at all if that's their ultimate decision). There is no collective decision required. In fact, I doubt it would be a viable outcome if it were our intention. Rather, the goal s to allow everyone to make an informed decision and, through that process, become the most effective advocates possible for their selected candidate. If we tried to enforce a collective decision making process, a good chunk of the group would end up being forced to go against their "gut" and work for a candidate that they did not zealously support. Not a recipe for a happy outcome for the individuals or the campaigns.

Ultimately, the strength of this group will come from having each person enter their selected campaign as energized and informed as possible. This will make them effective leaders. At the end of the primaries, regardless of which candidate wins, the network of relationships among group members will allow all of us to quickly jump into the nomineess campaign and deploy our energies there as well. Bottom line - the whole idea here was to make us all as effective participants as possible in the effort to "Win the White House" and, at the same time, form meaningful and long term personal relationships that will strengthen the entire Bay Area Dem community.

Reflecting back on my (extended) comments on Friday night, I do recall mentioning the idea of conducting some data collection on the group's activities over the course of the election cycle. I can see how this might have caused some of your confusion. The only intent is to try and guage the collective impact of the WWH08 participants on the'08 race. How much money was raised for eacn candidate and then the nominee? How many people assumed leadership positions in a campaign? How many people went to Iowa or traveled for the general election? The intent was to determine if we lived up to the seeming promise that the group holds. If at the end of the day we can demonstrate that WWH08 was a good investment of time and resources for both the individuals and campaigns involved, then it might be worthwhile to try to expand the concept to other regions in the next cycle.