I was a county delegate to the state Democratic convention, so I went to a convention center in Columbus yesterday and spent the day with Ohio Democrats. Right there next to us at the convention center was a Longaberger basket company training or meeting of some kind.
The CEO of Longaberger is co-chair of “Ohio Women for Mitt”:
Heading up the list are four Republicans: Jane Portman (wife of Senator Rob Portman), Karen Kasich (wife of Governor John Kasich), Lieutenant Governor Mary Taylor and Longaberger Company CEO Tami Longaberger.
Longaberger is a multi-level marketer. As Anne Laurie has mentioned, Romney has many donors and supporters in the multi-level marketing community.
I wandered over there and took this photo of the Longaberger pyramid chart in case you’re not familiar with MLM:
I was wearing my “credentials”, with OHIO DEMS 2012 printed in giant letters, but everyone in Longabergerland were grinning ear to ear and making welcoming noises when they saw me approach, maybe hoping to sign me up as a Longaberger distributor. I would insist on starting at Executive Director Central, though, rather than at the bottom of the pyramid, with the recruits. After all, Mitt Romney started right at the top at Bain. Why not me? If starting at the top is good enough for Bain, it should be good enough for Longaberger.
This my fourth Dem convention. I went to two state conventions prior to this one and one national convention and I think I finally figured out the real value of these things. It occurs to me that the people who need these gatherings the most are the Democrats who are in “red” areas, where we are a political minority.
There is really nothing like sitting in a huge room full of like-minded people if you are politically aware or locally active in Democratic or liberal politics and live day-to-day surrounded by Republicans and Tea Party members and conservatives. When I wander around and talk to people, the delegates who come from rural and Republican counties just talk and talk and talk. It’s as if they’ve been censoring themselves for the whole year, and have to tell me EACH and EVERY slight and outrage and infuriating thing that has happened since the last time I saw them.
This occurred to me only because three of us went to eat lunch outside and this young woman who was attending another convention (Pampered Chef) approached us and asked “are you ALL Democrats?” We ‘fessed up, came clean, guilty as charged, and she said she lived in a suburb of Cincinnati and was surrounded by Republicans, and she talked and talked and talked, so this isn’t even limited to activist Democrats. In the most Republican places there are all these liberals and Democrats roaming around, just silently fuming.
I’ll write about the serious things I learned later, Doctors for America, which you will love, and Lilly Ledbetter, who was there, but for now I’ll just introduce you to Ruby:
Ruby is 90 years old and she’s been politically active for 60 years. She lives in Carroll County although she’s originally from Kentucky. Carroll County didn’t do too poorly for Obama in ’08, although McCain carried the county.
I asked her if she thought it was going to be hard to get Obama re-elected, and she said: “oh, honey, it’s always hard.”
I found a Romney office (somewhat) near me, although I haven’t been out to see it yet:
The Romney campaign opened an office in Bowling Green Tuesday morning.
The “Victory Center of Northwest Ohio” is located on South Main Street. It is a place where volunteers can come together to help campaign, make phone calls, prepare for door-to-door walks and distribute yard signs.