Fellow Executive Committee Members:
After serious consideration of all of the candidates for Chair of the Tennessee Democratic Party, I have decided to cast my vote for Chip Forrester. We as a party are fortunate to have several qualified candidates to lead us. They each possess different and complementary skill sets; these should be utilized to further our successes no matter who is elected in Nashville. However, I believe that retaining Chip is in the best interest of our party at this time.
I supported Chip’s election last time, though I was not a member of the Executive Committee. He has always been someone I respect and admire as a role model and party leader. Like all of you, I am extremely dismayed at the 2010 election results. It would be easy to blame our chair, but that would lack a lot of critical insight. In relation to other states, Tennessee was about average. Some states saw more Democratic losses; some saw less. We cannot fully combat a national ideological movement, but we can solve issues that hold us back in Tennessee. Those include inconsistent messaging, party unity, & stability. Simply choosing someone new as Chair will not change our situation.
It has become popular to state that we lost because of message. That is fairly agreed upon, but there is no consensus for how to be more effective. I believe that our message must be more universal. We often fail to see the difference between governing and communicating with voters. The average voter does not have time to keep track of bills in Congress and complex issues. Instead, they vote for the candidates that most closely reflect their personal values. According to their propaganda, Republicans support families, freedom and prosperity. We of course know that they only really support families who look like theirs, a few cherry-picked freedoms from the constitution, and prosperity for the upper class.
How do Republicans convince voters of things that are not true? Because they are better at having a consistent, coherent message than we are. “Democrats are for jobs.” It has to be that simple in order to gain back the power we need to improve this country and this state. We cannot change it to “Democrats are for jobs, provided that A,B, & C…” I believe that Chip Forrester has provided the leadership and framework to get out our message. We simply need to be a unified force in order to get that message to the people. There is too much division within our shrinking ranks. If you run as a Democratic candidate, you should act and speak like one. If you are a Democratic donor, you should support the party and ideals no matter who is Chairman. And if you are an Executive Committee Member, you should support the winner of this race regardless of how you voted.
Reelecting Chip will give us greater stability by ending the practice of near-total turnover every two years. We reinvent the wheel every other January and then expect the new chair to instantly turn things around. That is not an effective way to run an organization. I would like to see Chip and his staff continue in their roles. They will then have the opportunity to learn from our missteps and build upon our successes.
I look forward to working with whomever is elected chair on January 8, but I sincerely believe that Chip is the best person for the job. Please consider joining me in my support for him. But more importantly, please support and work for whomever is chosen for the sake of our party and for Tennessee.
Respectfully,
Chris Anderson
TNDP Executive Committeeman, District 10
Former President, Tennessee Young Democrats
Former National Executive Vice President, Young Democrats of America
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