My $.02 worth

As Democrats go back to the drawing board in choosing the party leader on March 7 there are a lot of people wondering whether the message sent by the state committee last time was really heard. As I talk to people, some believe it has been, but when I look a little deeper, I'm not so sure. Here's why.

A lot of people remain unhappy about the 2008 election results. People expected to hear a contrite ADP leadership and expected some senior staff changes by the time of the state reorganization meeting along with some reasonable assessment of what went wrong. They didn't hear any of those. They heard a leadership that pointed the finger in other directions, statements of effectively "staying the course" and explanations that sounded more like C.Y.A. than anything else. As a result, they showed their displeasure by electing Paul Eckerstrom chairman.

Criticism of Paul's election was immediate and intense. Rumors spread he didn't have a job. Some said the chair can only come from Maricopa County since so much work has to be done at the office and the commute is problematic from Tucson. Some suggested that many in the state committee were new and these people voted for Paul because of his speech. Some vocally criticized his perceived lack of fundraising abilities. Some criticized his decision to run in the first place. The result was that instead of falling in line behind a newly and properly elected chairman and moving forward, the party turned on itself and created a level of discord I haven't seen in my years of involvement with the party.

The rumors don't deserve comment, so I won't bother. But the other issues I feel distract us from the real problems in the party and do little to move us forward and prepare for 2010. It is wrong to believe a chairperson can only come from Maricopa County. If corporate CEOs can telecommute from thousands of miles away, there is no excuse why our state chairperson can't telecommute from wherever they are. The ADP owns a car; let staff get in it a couple times a month and go to where the chair is. I think most people would agree it would actually help them to get out of Maricopa County every once in a while. Staff works for the chairperson, not the other way around.

As for the new committee members not knowing what they were doing, I think that is a misread of what happened. I think people clearly knew who Don was and had the same expectations as anyone else on the committee that day. They wanted accountability, explanations or change. They didn't get the former two so they voted for change. It's that simple.

I think it's a mistake to base a decision for chair solely on the actual or perceived ability to raise money. There are plenty of people in the state who could work with whomever the chairperson is and raise money. I've argued in the past that regardless of who gets elected, those who have the ability to raise money for the party have an obligation to do so. I don't care who it is. In my view that includes every elected Democrat in the state. That means Janet Napolitano, Harry Mitchell, Gabby Giffords, Ed Pastor, Raul Grijalva, Ann Kirpatrick, Terry Goddard, all Democratic members of the state legislature and local officials, former state and county leaders, the works. You're Democrats and the party helped you get where you are and some of you helped the party get to where it is today. I'm sure many of these people will help, but for those on the fence or refusing, the party needs your help. Whatever it is that's behind it, ego, feelings, I don't care, put them aside. Step up and lend a hand.

The chairperson decision also needs to be based on the ability to run an organization and move it forward. We need a chairperson who can take a dysfunctional organization and turn it into one that works. We need a chairperson who simply isn't going to rearrange the deck chairs and announce change has occurred. It was announced last week that Devon Rankin will be acting E.D. for the party. I hope that's only temporary and an active search for a permanent E.D. starts soon because Devon is a great fundraiser. That's her forte. Why anyone would want to take her out of that role and put her in a management position at a time of distress or discord simply doesn't make sense to me. We need her raising money, not deciding campaign strategies.

I hope they're not doing this, but I would also strongly argue that putting fundraising in the lap of an Executive Director is a setup for failure. Believe me, I know. It's unfair to the E.D. and it is simply an excuse to take the responsibility off those who should have it. The E.D. is a --management-- position, not a finance position. Keep Devon where she is and find someone outside who knows how to hire, fire, create a salable message, organize people and candidates and work the media. No offense to anyone, but I don't see that person in current staff and I don't see that person in the state.

There's a management training video called "The Abiliene Paradox" that describes a paradox in which a group of people collectively decide on a course of action that is counter to the best interests of the group because of a failure of communication between its members about their. It involves a common breakdown of group communication in which each member mistakenly believes that their own preferences are counter to the group's and, therefore, does not raise objections. This is what I fear we're seeing happen here. People know they want change, but aren't willing to stand up and say what they really think for fear of some recrimination or being labeled as "not a team player." What I hear on the street isn't what I'm hearing out of the party and that simply cannot be a good thing. Watch the trailer below if you don't get what I mean.



Of course, there's the complimentary concept of Group Think...



I have no idea who will run and if the position is contested who will win. I know what I think needs to be done and I think a lot of others generally seem to agree. Rearranging the deck chairs isn't the change we need or the change we can believe in. In his landmark study "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,' author Thomas Kuhn said shifts in paradigms always come from outside the existing one. I believe this last election shows conclusively that our party is in need of a shift, and that only looking in new directions, listening to different voices and encouraging people to share their real thoughts and not just "going along to get along." That doesn't strengthen the party.

That's my two cents worth...