Chris Dodd New Hampshire State Blog

Dodd Statement on New Hampshire Civil Unions

Matt Browner-Hamlin — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 16:05:19 -0500

Senator Chris Dodd issued the following statement on New Hampshire's Civil Unions law taking effect today.

"Today, New Hampshire took a big step forward in ensuring that gay and lesbian couples enjoy the same rights and responsibilities as their fellow citizens. I was proud to support civil unions in my home state of Connecticut and I was proud to support Governor Lynch and the State Legislature when they passed this law last spring. I hope that New Hampshire's commitment to providing equal rights and responsibilities to all its citizens will serve as a positive example for the rest of the country."

Susanthe has a great diary about this at Blue Hampshire.

Reading Material

Matt Browner-Hamlin — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 13:35:47 -0500

I took this picture inside our phone banking room in the Des Moines HQ. Amidst copies of the Des Moines Register, call logs, talking points, fact sheets of Chris Dodd's record of results and lots of empty coffee cups, I saw a print out of Blue Hampshire co-founder Mike Caulfield's endorsement post.

People often ask what the value of blogger endorsements is and I think this is evidence of it. Mike's argument in support of Chris Dodd, like that made by many other bloggers, is a thoughtful presentation of why Democrats should support Dodd's candidacy. It's exactly the sort of thing that volunteers and field staff find useful when talking to voters here in Iowa. Beyond that, it's great to have the encouragement of someone writing outside the campaign to pick you up in the midst of a long phone banking session.

Today, I'm heading on the road to cover Senator Dodd's events in Waterloo at one of my favorite restaurants in all of Iowa, Steamboat Gardens. From there, I'll head with the Senator to Dubuque for our campaign's New Year's Eve event.

I'll be staying on the road on New Year's Day to cover events in Cedar Rapids and a few other stops. I'll be posting videos and pictures from the road, as well as writing about the events as the Dodd campaign heads into the new year and towards the Iowa caucus on January 3rd.

Stay tuned for more updates from Iowa on the Dodd Blog.

10 Days and 10 Ways

Bryan DeAngelis — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 16:15:11 -0500

Only ten days to go until Primary Day. Now is the time to get out there and do everything you can to convince the voters of New Hampshire that we need Chris Dodd and his proven leadership in the Oval Office.

With that in mind, our field team has put together a list of ten things you can do between now and January 8th to help Chris Dodd win the New Hampshire Primary.

1. Take off time to volunteer on January 8th, Primary Day

2. Call undecided voters in your neighborhood

3. Write a letter to the editor

4. Put up a yard sign in your yard- or your families’ or friends’ yards

5. Write to an undecided voter about why they should support Chris Dodd with our neighbor to neighbor postcard program

6. Participate in a visibility to show your spirit

7. Volunteer to house a staffer for the period of time between the caucus and the primary day

8. Canvass and drop literature in your neighborhood

9. Call in to drive time radio shows and talk about why you support Chris Dodd

10. Make or donate food to feed our staff and volunteers

Mike Caulfield Endorses Chris Dodd

Matt Browner-Hamlin — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 05:36:44 -0500

I'm very happy to let everyone know that Mike Caulfield, one of the founders of Blue Hampshire, has endorsed Chris Dodd for President. Dean Barker, another Blue Hampshire co-founder, endorsed Senator Dodd in early September.

While Senator Dodd has been able to accumulate a great number of endorsements from a wide range of bloggers, Caulfield takes a very unique approach in writing his endorsement. Caulfield goes back over the course of Senator Dodd's twenty-six year tenure in the Senate and quotes news articles telling of Dodd's principled, progressive leadership in the face of adversity that produced real, meaningful change. Caulfield brings us back to Dodd's leadership in helping bring peace in Latin America and Northern Ireland, to standing up to the Reagan administration's bellicose foreign policy, to fighting tirelessly to pass the Family & Medical Leave Act, to managing the passage of McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform, and more.

After spanning an inspiring range of stories about Chris Dodd, Caulfield writes about why he think Chris Dodd should be our President:

Dodd entered the Senate the very year the conservative movement arrived to dismantle the the progressive dream wholesale. Yet in that environment, in the 25 year period that will go down as the Conservative Era, he found ways to expand and extend that progressive dream.

Sometimes it was by getting on TV and telling the truth, no matter how offensive the civilized members of his party may have found it.

Sometimes is was through thoughtful negotiation with enemies. Other times it was through skillful navigation of complex rules of parliamentary procedure. Sometimes it was a late evening bulldozer push. And yes, sometimes it was about waiting to the 17th hole of golf to bring up the question of Gerry Adams's visa.

But it was always about how to get things done.

I've seen this on the campaign. Confronted with any new tool, the first question that occurs to Team Dodd is not "Can we use this for marketing?" but "How can we use this to advance our progressive agenda?"

So while Hillary took online suggestions for a campaign song, Dodd took online suggestions for filibuster reading material. While Obama built up his MySpace account, Dodd and his team built tools to route anti-FISA calls to Senators. While other campaigns invited bloggers to phone calls where the latest talking points were recycled, Dodd invited us into war-room like sessions where the strategy for cutting war funding was discussed and explained.

Personally, I believe we are at a 1932 moment in history. The last gasp of the Reaganism that tainted even the Clinton administration is being played out on that Republican debate stage. After November, they will sweep the remains of that grand movement into the dustbin of history.

You could choose those that stood back, and waited until history was on their side before they moved bold agendas forward. You could hope that their theories of change were correct.

Or you could choose the person, who, against all odds, advanced the progressive agenda through every means at his disposal.

I've seen Dodd sailing against the wind and been amazed. I can only imagine what he will do with the wind at his back.

Please join me in supporting Chris Dodd.

His readers will be able to look at this and see with utmost clarity why he stands with Chris Dodd.

Frankly, I cannot imagine a more ringing endorsement of a candidate who is basing his run on a career of leadership that got the job done than one in which the author sees results as the true test of the value of a person's words. I'm impressed that Mike - like many New Hampshire voters and astute political commentators - isn't content to decide who he will be voting for based on the coverage we're seeing about rhetoric being bandied about today. Instead he looks at Dodd's full record and measures the other Democratic candidates against it.

One of the themes that Caulfield brings out most convincingly is that Chris Dodd didn't just find out what he believes in when he started running for President. He didn't gain his voice when handed the microphone of a presidential candidacy - he's always had the courage to speak out on principle. He doesn't measure his experience by the resumes of the people advising him on policy - he helped shape the course of our country over twenty-six years in the Senate. He has consistently produced results that Democrats can be proud of.

As Mike writes, "I've seen Dodd sailing against the wind and been amazed. I can only imagine what he will do with the wind at his back."

Thank you for your support Mike! With your help and the help of countless others, we will see Chris Dodd in the White House in January 2009.

Sen. Dodd and Democracy in Action

Bryan DeAngelis — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 14:39:31 -0500

I hope everyone had a great Holiday. We came back from a short break to find another great letter to the editor about Senator Dodd's FISA fight. This one comes from Andrea Calandrella of Lebanon. It ran in today's Valley News.

There was a showdown on the floor of the US Senate on Dec. 17. The debate was over the proposed renewal of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). At stake was nothing less than the US Constitution and the preservation of our civil liberties.

The specific issue was a provision to grant retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that illegally disclosed millions of private records, including yours and mine. These disclosures were made in response to warrantless requests from the Bush administration beginning in February 2001, months before 9/11.

FISA as it exists provides reasonable means to conduct surveillance legally and with proper oversight. To date, only 5 of 18,000 requests under FISA have ever been rejected. If the telecom companies acted in a legal manner, there is no need for immunity. If they acted illegally, the proper place to address this is in a court.

Chris Dodd left the presidential campaign trail to fight this granting of retroactive immunity. With passion and eloquence, he held the floor for over 8 hours on Monday until the majority leader, Harry Reid, postponed action on the bill until January 2008. Without Chris Dodd’s leadership and political backbone, there is no doubt that the bill would have passed with the inclusion of retroactive immunity. Watching him on C-SPAN was seeing democracy and statesmanship in action.

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"Dodd was right"

Matt Browner-Hamlin — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 13:04:49 -0500

The Concord Monitor has a letter to editor about Dodd's success in the FISA fight.

As the rest of us were out shopping on Monday, Sen. Chris Dodd left the Iowa campaign prepared to filibuster a "get out of jail free" provision in the FISA bill.

The Bush administration is threatening to veto a much needed revision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that would continue to allow our National Security Agency to intercept potential foreign terrorist communications if Congress does not include the okay to let phone companies off the hook for surveilling on U.S. citizens' communications without proper authority. Dodd stood up to yet another Bush threat by standing firm.

C-SPAN televised the whole abusive attempt by the White House with initial support from Democrat Harry Reid to usher this bill through the Senate as we got ready for Christmas. It blatantly tramples on our constitutional rights against illegal surveillance under the Fourth Amendment, and it was not just an incident or two but millions of phone calls and e-mails over a five-year period.

The FISA bill allows us the security of monitoring terrorist phone calls, but they need to be approved by the FISA courts - a judicial oversight process of checks and balances.

If you believe that the executive branch needs to follow the rule of law, tell your senator to support Chris Dodd's insistence that there should not be any "retroactivity exclusion" in this bill handed to the phone companies. This will come up again in the New Year. Do not let them attempt to sneak it through again.

PATRICK CLARK

Tilton

Dodd's ready to hit ground running

Bryan DeAngelis — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 09:48:48 -0500

On Sunday, State Representative Marcia Moody's letter about why she supports Chris Dodd was published in the Portsmouth Herald. You can read the entire letter below.

We'd like to thank Marcia and all of Senator Dodd's supporters who have been writing to their local papers to let their neighbors and friends know why they support Chris Dodd.

"We few. We happy few, we band of brothers" is a quote from Shakespeare's Henry V as he addresses his soldiers at the battle of Agincourt against the overwhelming odds of the French army. We few, we happy "privileged" few here in New Hampshire for over 40 years have had the unique opportunity of getting to meet person-to-person with each and every presidential candidate before they go into battle to win the nomination. This is done by town hall meetings, rallies, picnics, local parades and with that very special event known as house parties.

Even though these parties are held in a person's home, they are open to all. With the help of the Internet, the event is advertised well in advance and all you need to do to attend is RSVP. This is not some "media" event where candidates get up and make a speech before crowds of thousands and get to tell you what THEY think and what they want you to hear. They still give speeches, but afterward we get to grill them, make them be specific, make them clarify statements, catch them in contradictions, and have them be really responsible for what they say. It is the best training a candidate can ever have. It gives them more than a 60-second sound bite that they get in a debate. And it gives them a chance to really have to think for a change and not rely on canned responses.

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Hope, change and electability

Bryan DeAngelis — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 14:06:03 -0500

Jim McConaha of Concord published the following letter to the editor in today's Concord Monitor.

In the Democratic field there is one presidential candidate that brings hope, change, experience and electability to this race. He is Chris Dodd.

Chris Dodd promises that his first task as president will be to restore the Constitution and the rule of law, to restore America's standing in the world.

But what I want most in the next president is someone who will end the war - the war in Iraq and the war in Washington. I want a president who will work to put an end to the epidemic of fighting with the other party, with interest groups, or anybody who disagrees.

Chris Dodd has a gift for turning opponents into allies.

Chris Dodd for president: leadership, even -- especially -- when it's lonely

Matt Browner-Hamlin — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 16:32:57 -0500

Today Senator Dodd has picked up another great blogger endorsement. David of Blue Mass Group, Massachusetts' leading community blog, has a ringing endorsement post up now.

[T]here's only one candidate among the current crop who has really stood out on multiple occasions when true leadership was called for. Even when it meant taking a lonely stand that was going to annoy not only the president, but the head honchos of his own party. Even when it meant leaving the campaign for an indeterminate period of time, because what was going on in the US Senate -- his day job -- was more important. Sure, other Democrats quickly fell into line once he got the ball rolling. But on Michael Mukasey, on habeas corpus, and most recently on FISA, one guy has taken that all-important first step, regardless of the cost to his campaign and to his comfort level in the go-along-to-get-along Senate.

That guy is Chris Dodd.
...
At the end of the day, I want someone whose leadership I can count on when the going is really rough. Obama, Clinton, and the rest of the gang may well be able to deliver that, and I hope they can. But we really don't know, because they haven't done it yet. (And no, telling auto workers that cars need to get better gas mileage doesn't count.) Dodd was the first Dem to publicly oppose Mukasey when the rest of the Dems seemed resigned to the notion that if we don't confirm this guy, Bush will just give us someone worse; and he probably annoyed Harry Reid no end with his FISAbuster, thereby making life more difficult for himself should he remain in the Senate. He has consistently led the pack on some of the most important issues to have hit the Senate recently; the others have followed.

Finally, a word about "electability." Dodd, of course, is not favored to win the nomination, nor is he expected to come close in any of the early caucuses or primaries. I don't care. I am not interested in basing my vote on what I, the pollsters, or the media think that other voters are going to do. I cannot control their votes, and of course it's possible that the predictions may be wrong in any event. The only vote I can control is mine, and I plan to cast it for the candidate who I think would actually make the best president. Hopefully he will remain in the race through February 5 so that I have the chance to do so.

As I said above, on some very big recent issues, Dodd has consistently led, and the others have followed. I want the leader.

Absolutely! Leadership is what this country needs, and as we saw earlier today with Jason Rosenbaum's post on MyDD, Dodd's supporters are people who think the best way to pick our country's leader is by looking at who is leading now. That person is Chris Dodd and David makes a great case for why. Welcome to the Dodd Squad, David!

"Dodd is a leader"

Bryan DeAngelis — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 13:28:53 -0500

State Representative Mary Stuart Gile, one of Senator Dodd's strongest Granite State supporters, wrote the following Letter to the Editor that appeared in today's Concord Monitor:

Sen. Chris Dodd is my first choice for president because of his commitment to public service, families, children and national security. He has an outstanding legislative record and platform, especially his program for national service. His experience in the Peace Corps and the military and his 30 years in the U.S. Senate have provided the wisdom, judgment and leadership America needs.

Millions of children start school ready to learn everyday because of Dodd's tireless efforts to improve the availability and quality of Head Start. He is the leading advocate for children in Congress and was honored as the "Senator of the Decade" by the National Head Start Association.

In the last four years, thanks to Sen. Dodd, New Hampshire has received more than $53 million in Child Care Development Block Grant funds, providing scholarships for thousands of children and working families to attend quality child care and education and training for hundreds of New Hampshire child care providers.

Sen. Dodd's historic Family Medical Leave Act allows workers up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for illness, to care for a new child or sick family member. He sponsored the FIRE and SAFER Acts, providing $3 billion in federal assistance to fire departments across the United States. He also authored the Help America Vote Act, enabling individuals with disabilities to vote independently.

Sen. Dodd has been a leader in national security, foreign affairs, business and finance. He will bring integrity to the Oval Office, unite our nation and restore America's role as a beacon of freedom and democracy in the world.