(cross-posted at Daily Kos)
As some of you may or may not know from my profile, I’m currently attending the University of Pennsylvania. Being a member of the Penn College Democrats has been one of the best experiences to date I’ve had while attending college – it’s a great way to meet people and to get involved in politics while in school. That being said, there’s a great disparity between the operations of the College Republicans and the College Democrats, even though we outnumber the GOP in great numbers at the college level. It’s one of the reasons I’m serving as part of the finance team in Penn’s chapter of the College Democrats – we need to keep working towards building more active political involvement at the college level, and we need to start supporting the leaders of tomorrow. You may not like Karl Rove or Jack Abramoff, but they were former heads of the College Republicans nationwide. This points to a Republican hierarchy that is able to groom their future leaders now, while there is no such similar, coherent structure in place for the Democratic Party.
As such, it’s difficult to participate in many activities, even when it’s helping out for local congressional races. Oftentimes, it’s difficult to convince students to spend a Saturday afternoon participating in events when they have to pay their way to take SEPTA out to Bucks County or other suburban areas of Philadelphia. The lack of funds is also another reason that we can’t sponsor many events outside of our weekly scheduled meetings. As a partisan political group, we can’t receive funding from the university, and the College Democrats of America (CDA), is extremely disorganized and provide us with little to no funding. Essentially, what we’re aiming to do here at Penn’s campus is to build a self-sustaining organization that will be able to attract larger numbers to the Democratic Party. This is our strength, and if we have the resources to take advantage of the overwhelming majority we have on this campus (according to our 2004 poll count of the machines on campus, roughly 80% voted for Kerry) and most college campuses nationwide, we wouldn’t be worried so much about not having the political talent – it would already be there.
In a week, the Penn College Democrats will be hosting a fundraiser on campus. While I recognize that most of the readers of dKos most likely are not located in the Philadelphia area, I would personally appreciate anyone who is in the area coming to our event. Currently, we have congressional candidates Patrick Murphy and Lois Murphy speaking, along with former congressman and 2004 U.S. Senate candidate Joe Hoeffel, City Councilman and mayoral candidate Michael Nutter, and two of the more well-known bloggers in the Philadelphia area – Chris Bowers of MyDD and Duncan Black, who is better known as Atrios. Other invited speakers include Penn alum Governor Ed Rendell, senatorial candidate Bob Casey, Jr., and Representative Chakah Fattah. The event will take place on Tuesday, April 4 and will be located at 200 College Hall – on Penn’s campus, this is located between 34th and 36th Streets, between Walnut and Spruce; if you’re on campus, it is the building that has a statue of Benjamin Franklin in front of it. The event will begin at 7 PM and conclude at 9 PM, and hors d’oeuvres and beverages will be served. Suggested contributions are as follows: hosts – $250, friend – $50, student – $10.
I know that it is a long process in rebuilding the Democratic Party, but I believe that it’s essential that not only do we rebuild the state parties, as current DNC chair Howard Dean is doing, but we need to strengthen our organization at the college level to take advantage of our majorities at the younger age groups and get more people involved in the political process. Once again, thanks for taking the time out to read this, and if any of you are in the Philadelphia area, I’d be delighted if you could attend. I know that Booman Tribune is a Philly-based blog, and it’d be wonderful if some of the netroots could turn out for the Penn Dems. Thanks!