Published: November 05, 2009 12:15 am         

Activists celebrate where they were this time last year

TERRE HAUTE — Snacking on cheese and crackers in an upstairs apartment, political activists took time to celebrate where they were this time last year.

Jim Wright, a local activist with Organizing for America, hosted an informal reunion of President Barack Obama’s campaign supporters on the second floor of a former Unitarian Church carriage house at 416 S. Sixth St.

Wright recounted for about a dozen volunteers how what began as an underdog’s campaign staff has, since his election, grown into a national community service arm of the Democratic National Party, into Organizing for America.

“That’s really just what this is,” he said, describing a “reunion,” as visitors prepared to a watch a video of the HBO documentary which aired Tuesday detailing the inside workings of Obama’s 2008 campaign.

But with Obama in the White House, their real work has just begun. Wright said it’s imperative that supporters maintain pressure on U.S. Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Evansville), U.S. Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) and their colleagues to drive home the legislative promises which took Obama to the presidency.

“We need to remember what we were doing a year ago,” he said, explaining the importance of maintaining the group’s organization and energy.

Angie Heath, a Vigo County schoolteacher, said Obama’s was the first campaign in which she’d ever participated.

“I got involved because of the candidate,” she said, describing health care reform as “something I’m passionate about.”

Heath recalled many of those knocking on doors alongside her last year were also political newbies, but she said her concern for the cost of medical care pushed her into the movement. As a teacher and parent, Heath said she’s seen the impact catastrophic illness can have on a family. And while battles still rage in Congress concerning Obama’s proposed health care reforms, Heath said she’s concerned yet hopeful that a fiscally feasible solution can be reached. Personally, she supports the “public option,” and said she feels those opposed to it are under the misconception that it is a government takeover instead of “just another option.”

Kim Danner also listed health care reform as topping her concerns. A recent biopsy scare made her wonder what might happen if she lost her existing coverage and had to conduct a search while bearing a pre-existing condition.

Danner said she had supported Sen. John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign, and so when the Democratic senator from Massachusetts supported his colleague from Illinois, she followed suit.

“He was such an exciting candidate,” she recalled, describing his recitations from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech as “inspiring.”

Most of her friends supported then-Sen. Hillary Clinton from New York in the primary, but Danner was pro-Obama from start to finish, knocking on doors and making phone calls.

These days, the Red Lobster employee said she helps out with Organizing for America when she can find the time. “I just kind of do what I can.”

The Democrats lost governors’ seats in New Jersey and Virginia in Tuesday night’s election, but Wright said he doesn’t think that’s a major problem. “Traditionally, Virginia is a Red State,” he said, noting the historical significance of Obama actually winning it last year. New Jersey was a loss, he admitted, but the Democrats picked up a congressional seat in New York’s historically Republican 23rd district. The split within the GOP between social conservatives and moderates, demonstrated by the emergence of a Conservative Party contender, balances out the New Jersey loss, he said.

“That’s the first Democrat there in 120 years,” he said.

Brian Boyce can be reached at 812-231-4253 or brian.boyce@tribstar.com.