Democrats of St. Mary's County Maryland

2007 October Party Line
Read the articles from our newsletter

2nd Annual Golf Tournament
It was a great day of golf! Over 60 golfers participated in our 2nd annual golf tournament. Thank you to John Parlett and his team for making this event so successful. Special thanks to our Co-Chairs: Jack Russell, Tom Mattingly, Dan Raley, and to our sponsors CMI General Contractors, Inc., Burch Oil, Burch Oil Subway, Community Bank of Tri County, and Guy Distributing. This tournament and our annual dinner are the primary fundraisers for our party. We are extremely grateful for everyone who participated in making this event so much fun and so successful. We need to continue to work hard during the “non-election” years so we will be better able to support our candidates during the campaign season.

Thank You to the 2007 Golfers!! Larry Wood Gary Bell Kenny Wood Jim Banagan Joe Burch Donnie Burch Richard Early Jaoh Watkins Scott White Pete White Raynor Blair Danny Norris Tim Cameron Vince Whittles Bruce Nichol Robert Russell, Jr. Mark Cullison Randy Guy Pete Detemple Bill Jensen Steve Detemple Arron Detemple John Cullison Daniel Detemple Mark Rinaldi Paul Summers Steve Mote John Parlett Tommy Mattingly Danny Raley Dennis Canavan Karl Pence Charlie Roach Bill Mckissick Patrick Dugan Chris Longmore Steve Hancock Jimmy Matthews Joann Daierlein Wayne Lockman Jim Simpson Barbara Simpson Gary Simpson Rick Raley Mike Mummaugh Al Flury Steve Zumpano Teeny Guy Frank Bell Bill Darden Mike Adams Tom Hodges Pat Fury Celeste Fury Phil Dorsey Puff Barthelme Ton Jensen Chipper Norris

Citizen Survey
The St Mary’s County Sheriff's Office is distributing their Citizen Survey for 2007. Please visit their website at www.firstsheriff.com

Your participation will help in the continued efforts of the Sheriff's Office to provide adequate services and a safe St Mary’s. Thank you for your time and interest.

Club TShirts for sale
The Club has white polo shirts with the Club logo for sale for $27.00. Contact the club at president@smcdem.org

Democratic Club Meeting: September 2007 summary
The September Democratic Club meeting featured St. Mary’s County Public School Superintendent Dr. Michael Martirano. Dr. Martirano joined club members for dinner and informal conversation at 6 and began his formal presentation at 7.

Dr. Martirano discussed many of the new initiatives put into place for the 2007-2008 school year including the STEM Academies and the Charter School He talked about the emphasis on the middle schools including an expanded Math period for 7th and 8th graders and the expansion of freshman sports at the high schools to include football, basketball and cheerleading. Other topics of interest included safety issues and the redesigned school vestibules, the emphasis on recruiting minority staff members, the new Evergreen Elementary School slated for the Wildewood development, and the technology enhancements for this year with the addition of E-School. The 30 members present had many questions for Dr. Martirano about the direction of the High School Assessments, new schools in the pipeline, and additional technology.

The business section of the meeting focused on the Club’s plans for the St. Mary’s County Fair including setting up, staffing, and dismantling the Club booth and plans for the parade. The 2nd Annual Democratic Club Golf Tournament scheduled for Thursday September 27 was also a focus for discussion. The Blessing of the Fleet in October was the third up-coming event.

The Club also has white polo shirts with the Club logo for sale for $27.00. Jane Yowaski was the winner of a shirt as a door prize with the birthday closest to the Club meeting date. Jane was 87 years young on September 22 and still marched in the parade and staffed the booth daily. Thank you, Jane, for being a good role model for all Democrats. See Cindy Slattery to purchase a shirt.

The next Club meeting will be October 15th at Lenny’s Restaurant in California. Join us at 6pm for dinner and conversation. The meeting starts at 7pm.

Democratic Club Straw Poll
St. Mary's County Fair, September 2007

Fair goers were invited to participate in a straw poll of Democratic candidates for president. They were asked, “if the election was today, who would you support?” 196 people participated in the poll. Here are the results.

Hillary Clinton - 41.8%
Barack Obama – 23%
John Edwards – 19.3%
Bill Richardson – 5.2%
Joe Biden – 4%
Chris Dodd – 1.5%
Dennis Kucinich – 1.5%
Mike Gravel - .7%
Al Gore - .7%

How to become a Delegate to the Democratic National Convention
Want to be a delegate to the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver? Six Frequently Asked Questions

Question: I want to become a convention delegate and I am supporting a particular presidential candidate. Should I contact the Presidential campaign and express my interest in serving as a delegate at the convention?
Answer: Yes, contact the Presidential Campaign that you are involved in and express your interest. A list of presidential campaign contact information is on back page. 2.

Question: What is the formal process for becoming a Presidential delegate? Where do I file to become a delegate?
Answer: An individual can qualify as a candidate for a 2008 Democratic National Convention delegate or alternate position and run in Democratic Primary by:
a) filing a statement of candidacy,
b) designating your presidential preference and
c) signing a pledge of support for the Presidential candidate.
These materials must be filed with the Maryland State Board of Elections. You can file beginning November 15, 2007 and the deadline to file is December 3, 2007. 151 West Street, Suite 200 Annapolis, MD 21401 Office hours are 8:00 am â?“ 5:00 pm, Monday through Friday (800)222-8683 Info@Elections.State.MD.US

Question: Once I file, what happens next? Is my name placed on the ballot to be voted on during the February 12, 2008 primary?
Answer: The State Party Chair shares the list of filed delegate candidates with the Presidential campaigns on December 4, 2007. The Presidential campaigns may approve a number of names that is the same as a or greater than -- the number of delegate positions. So, if you want to be on this approved list, again, you should contact the Presidential campaign of your choice. The top vote getters for the Presidential candidates are entitled to delegates (if the Presidential candidate garners more than 15%).
So, if Presidential candidate A is entitled to 2 delegates and candidate B is entitled to one delegate, the top 2 vote getters for candidate A win and the top one voter getter for candidate B wins, even if the top vote getter for candidate B has less votes than the third vote getter for Candidate A. To review the names of the individuals that were selected in 2004, go to: http://www.msa.md.gov/msa/mdmanual/40party/html/demc.html

Question: If I run in the primary, what are my chances of being selected?
Answer: Each Presidential candidate will be given delegates based upon the percentage of votes that the Presidential candidate garners. Convention delegates and alternates will be given to Presidential candidates that receive at least 15% of the primary vote.

Question: Should I campaign and ask people to vote for me? Do I have to report my expenditures to the Federal Government?
Answer: Yes, you should engage in an active campaign to secure voters and feel free to contact neighbors and friends, etc. to ask them to vote for you. You can raise money for this effort (campaigning, travel to the convention), but the money must come from federally-permissible donors (individuals); you may not receive funds from unions, corporations or non-citizens of the United States. You do not have to file a report with the Federal Election Commission unless you are part of a slate. For more information about delegate compliance, please go to http://www.fec.gov/pages/brochures/delegate.shtml.

Important Dates Date Activity
-December 3, 2007 Deadline for Convention Delegates to File a Statement of Candidacy with the State Board of Elections
-December 4, 2007 The State Party gives a list of those candidates that have applied to the Presidential campaigns
-December 6, 2007 Presidential campaign provides a list of approved delegates to the State Party
- February 12, 2008 Primary Election April 18, 2008 At-large delegate candidate deadline for filing the statement of candidacy and pledge of support forms with the State Party
To read the entire Maryland Delegate Selection Plan, go to www.mddems.org and click 2008 Maryland Delegate Selection Plan

Michael Cain: New Director for Center for Study of Democracy
Welcome Michael Cain!! -Acting Director Of The Center For The Study Of Democracy (St. Mary’s City, MD) August 27, 2007–

St. Mary’s College of Maryland has selected Michael Cain of Leonardtown, Maryland, to be the acting director of the college’s Center for the Study of Democracy. Cain has been a member of the faculty since 1999 and is currently chairman of the political science department. Maggie O’Brien, president of the College, said, “"In the early stages of our planning for the Center, long before the first sponsored lecture or event that marks the Center's activities today, Professor Cain was enthusiastically writing funding proposals that made possible the Center's first five years. He's been the most important secret asset in the mix: in fact, the Center might still be on the drawing board were it not for Professor Cain's early enthusiasm and commitment. I'm particularly delighted that he will bring us much experience from his international work with U.S, Agency for International Development over the past three years."

Cain received his bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Rutgers University and his Ph.D. in government and politics from the University of Maryland. He has taught political science and public policy at the University of Maryland, the University of Mississippi and the University of Warsaw in Poland. His teaching and research has focused on ways to strengthen democratic participation and civic engagement of citizens.

Cain brings over ten years of domestic and international political experience to this position. For the past two years he helped organize professors in Maryland to serve as election judges in the state. He provided expert testimony to the House Ways and Means Committee in the Maryland House of Delegates on the administration of elections earlier this year. For over six years Cain served as a senior policy advisor to the United States Agency for International Development, providing technical advice to new democracies in Central Europe and Eurasia, including the states of Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Poland and Kazakhstan.

He received fellowships from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies. During the past five years, Cain has been a frequent contributor to Center events. Since the founding of the Center in 2001, Cain has been deeply involved in securing external funding. He authored the first external grant award received by the Center in 2002 from the Library of Congress Open World Leadership program. Cain was a principle author for the $500,000 National Endowment for the Humanities “We the People” challenge grant received by the Center in 2004.

He has also helped develop the new “Democracy Studies” program at the college. “The Center for the Study of Democracy is an important part of Maryland’s political landscape,” said Cain. “It has made a real difference in educating people about political issues and their sig-nificance in our lives. I intend to continue the Center’s broad political engagement of students while encouraging the wider Maryland community to discuss pressing political issues facing our democracy.” This year the Center plans to host talks and forums on Latin American politics and immigration, the Iraq war, terrorism and the media, health care in Maryland and discussions on the form of local government in the state.

New Polling Places
The polling place in Lexington Park has moved from the Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church to Green Holly Elementary School. The two polling places at Leonardtown Middle School will be split. A new precinct 3-5 will move to Leonardtown High School.

There is still a need for poll workers and election judges. For more information call 301-475-7844 ext. 1611

SMC Democratic Club Meeting
Please join us on Monday October 15th at Lenny’s in California at 7:00pm for our monthly club meeting. The Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) is the first grassroots, nonprofit organization dedicated exclusively to fighting global warming in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Their mission is to educate and mobilize citizens of this region in a way that fosters a rapid societal switch to clean energy and energy-efficient products, thus joining similar efforts worldwide to slow and perhaps halt the dangerous trend of global warming.

Our guest, Holly Gorman, is a Maryland native who split her childhood years between Ellicott City and Germany. She attended St Mary's College in Southern Maryland, graduating in 2007 with a degree in English and Religious Studies. While there, she demonstrated her commitment to the environmental movement by working with other students and staff members to clean up beaches, encourage recycling on campus, highlight the bonuses of eating local and organic foods, and fighting global warming. She is outrageously excited to work as the Maryland Organizer for CCAN, because it means that she can work on saving the world full-time, without having to worry about silly things like classes distracting her.

St. Mary's College Democrats Return
Dear Club Members,
We're back! We had a very busy summer and are glad to be at our home away from home. From interning on Mayoral Races in Baltimore to attending the College Democrats of America Convention in South Carolina and even interning for Steny Hoyer on Capitol Hill the College Dems did not stray far from politics. This semester our executive board is comprised of Anne Marie Metzler, Erin McDermott, Jae Lim, Catherine Goldsmith and Joseph Franchella. The first meeting of the year will be held in the Lewis Quad Recreation Room at 8:15 pm on Wednesday September 5th. We hope to host several events throughout the year and invite you to all our meetings.

Yours, The St. Mary's College Democrats

Anne Marie Metzler

St. Mary's County Fair
Many thanks to everyone who worked to support Democrats at the Fair. The booth was covered for the entire fair and we had a lot of conversations about the future of St. Mary’s County and the future of our country. Special thanks to Dave Zylak, Merl Evans, Sonny Burch, Joannie Williams, Elizabeth Knight, Nell Hampton, Ann Raley, and Leslie Roberts who all help set up and take down the booth and return everything to Leonardtown.