Blue America-- What We Do

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Are you a "member" of Blue America? All you have to do is contribute any amount to any of our candidates or campaigns. These are the ones we have going right now:

Our main page is for progressive candidates running for the House this year.

Our Senate page has slots to contribute to the 3 candidates running this year who we felt were good enough to contribute to.

Our Independent Expenditure Committee allows us to run TV, newspaper and radio ads, billboard campaigns, GOTV efforts, etc and they work independently of the candidates. That's the one where there are no limits on the amount you can contribute.

Our page for candidates backing the alternative to Austerity we call Americans For Real Prosperity.

We have one contest still running; it's for a Frank Sinatra platinum award and the contributions go to benefit Lee Rogers' struggle against super-corrupt House Armed Services Committee chairman Buck McKeon.

We have a page specifically geared towards replacing Congress' most vicious anti-LGBT bigots-- the worst of the worst.

We have a page up specifically to send a message to the corrupt Democratic insiders in Washington.

We have individual pages up for Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ), Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Patsy Keever (D-NC). And there's one devoted exclusively to Stopping Paul Ryan before he can do more harm to the country.

And we have one to collect contributions for the next generation of congressional leaders-- outstanding state legislators.

This past weekend Digby sent all the Blue America members a summary about what the PAC has been up to. If you didn't get it, here's your opportunity to give it a glance through and see if it's something you'd be willing to be a part of.

Thanks to you, Blue America has managed to raise over a half a million dollars for our candidates and campaigns this cycle-- which ain't half bad for a bunch of small donors (and a couple of very generous, good friends .) It occurred to us the other day that we should give everyone a little update on what we're doing around the country in these final weeks of the campaign.

One of the most successful fundraising ideas we've had so far is the Rock and Roll Memorabilia drawings. These have garnered attention far and wide and resulted in bringing in some big bucks for our candidates. Lucky donors have received a guitar signed by Joan Jett and an RIAA Depeche Mode platinum award to benefit Paul Ryan's opponent Rob Zerban in Wisconsin, an autographed Green Day guitar to benefit Alan Grayson, rare platinum awards from BBKing and Eric Clapton for Patsy Keever in North Carolina and a B52s multi-platinum award on behalf of Zerban and Lee Rogers in California (which we did in partnership with Progressive Democrats of America.) Our current drawing is in concert with Peace Action Now-- a Frank Sinatra platinum award to benefit Rogers.

Howie, John and I had quite a laugh the other day when the Romney campaign stole our idea and announced that they were holding a contest for a guitar signed by Kid Rock and Paul Ryan. (We hear they're auctioning off one of Meatloaf's sweaty handkerchiefs and a couple of Ted Nugent's spent bullets next.)

Right now we are running either Blue America Independent Expenditure campaigns or Blue America PAC campaigns in several districts. Corrupt Republican Buck Mckeon is *not* enjoying the radio ads we are sponsoring with The Buck Stops Now, which are currently blanketing his district in both English and Spanish. And the TV ad we're running in his district has him no less agitated. (If you can help us keep it going, the link to our Independent Expenditure committee is here.)

And Republicans really hate our mobile billboards. We've got one chasing Old Buck all over his district and driving back and forth in front of his office all day long. And there's another one we're running in PA-16 for Aryanna Strader, who's challenging one of the most cretinous, anti-woman throwbacks in the House, Congressman Joe Pitts.

Voters in Paul Ryan's district are seeing ads in all the local papers calling him a liar about Medicare. Which he is. And we've got an independent expenditure "Burma Shave"  style billboard campaign going all over the rural byways of Wisconsin.

The vast majority of the money we collect from you goes to the candidates we endorse and to whom you donate directly through our Act Blue page. Only about five percent of regular donations go to the PAC and we use that money for these campaigns in the districts. (There are a few larger donors who contributed to our IE, for which we're extremely grateful.)

It's a purely volunteer effort-- we don't have the money to employ anyone and we don't take a penny for ourselves-- so these are all shoestring campaigns. But we feel strongly about doing the best we can to support progressives who are doing the truly difficult work of campaigning and who need to know that there are people who support their causes even when the political professionals can't be bothered. There are campaigns out there that are winnable, if they only had enough money to compete. The Party bigwigs are convinced of the conventional wisdom that progressives can never win and that "independent" automatically means "centrist" and so they ignore these races and put their money in quixotic campaigns where it's right wing New Dem against Republican wingnut. They are going to lose those races and that money will have been thrown away.

But nonetheless, next month it's very likely there are going to be some new (and returning) progressives in the House and in the Senate. And they all know who their friends are. You. Because when the chips were down and the Party panicked after 2010, these candidates turned to the grassroots and the Netroots to help them keep their campaigns alive long enough to get some traction. In this polarized political world, the neanderthal Blue Dogs have gone extinct. The progressives, on the other hand, are getting stronger.

This campaign has been a lot of fun and hugely rewarding, even the painful losses. We saw progressive candidates coming together after primaries, working their networks on each others behalf for the very first time. Progressive incumbents are making themselves available for consultation and support. Netroots/grassroots groups are working together in many different ways. Little by little, this ship is turning.

If you would care to help these candidates get over the hump, you can donate here to our House page and here to our Senate page. And if you'd like to help us pay for these billboards, ads and radio spots, this is the place. It's all in a good cause.

And none of it could have happened without you. Thank You.

We'd like to do one more thing to help Lee Rogers beat Buck McKeon-- this ad below. If you can help out, we'll close the last few days with this ad on Santa Clarita TV: