I want more progressive candidates, even in Red States! Therefore, I will:

[hfojvt]

19. I am not in Goyle's district

I ran as a Democrat in my own district.

Although one of my problems was that I did not promote that fact.

I kinda felt bad about running, in the end.

It went like this. First, a State Senator declare for the seat. She quickly raised about $250,000, decided money wasn't coming fast enough and dropped out after a month. This was December 2009. Cheryl said she was running in January. I went to the Democratic Convention in late February, hoping to hear her speak. She stood up and introduced herself, but seemed unwilling, or unable, to speak.

So she didn't seem like a viable candidate to me. Another guy announced his interest in the seat at that time as well, and gave a poor speech.

So here it was April. Cheryl still had not filed, nor was she doing any campaigning other than having a half-completed website. Having spent a month debating it and formulating plans, at that point, I decided - I am in, paid the filing fee, sent an email to all the newspapers in the district and drove to Pittsburg to speak at a meeting of the Crawford County Democrats.

Then I proceeded to barnstorm the district, trying to visit every town with more than 1,000 people in a district covering 1/3 of the state.

Later though, Cheryl did file, and she got better at speaking (although her speech at the Topeka event was kind of a dud). So I kind of wish I had just supported her instead of spending my own time and money. I could have instead spent more time with my new puppies.