The time for change is now

Why do Republicans always have to play the blame game? The Republican Party and their home owned news stations plus their home owned reporters love to point out any problems our party has during an election. All you have to do is turn on a local news station or open the local paper to see what a field day they are having with this caucus. New Mexico had one of the largest turnouts in history on Tuesday, February 5, 2008. Voting went from a projected 30,000 to 40,000 up to 140,000 plus. We ran out of ballots no surprise in that was there. We worked our fingers to the bone to make sure that everyone got to cast a vote. Yes, there were long lines at the caucus sites. Democrats are sick to death of the way Republicans have been destroying our dreams over the previous seven years. We will turn out in force to see that things do change and do get better for the middle class and low income families.

New Mexico Democratic State Party Chair Brian Colon should have handled some issues differently. The party should have had early caucus sites which would have warned of higher voter turnout and given some people a chance to vote at a time when the flow of voters was not as great. We should have had the caucus sites open earlier in the day. We also needed to recruit younger people to help work the caucus sites in peak voting times. I like most Democrats don’t like the idea that any voters were turned away for any reason from a caucus site. As I have said before, the Democratic Party is not in the business to keep people from voting.

The Governor was right in expressing his concern about the way the election was handled. We needed to be more prepared for the larger turnout of voters. Having just said that we needed more voting opportunity, it should also be pointed out that the Democratic Party should always have the problem of running out of ballots and long lines to vote in a party caucus because of high voter turnout. It was after all a good result when we had such a record setting turnout year. The voters that stood in long lines for hours should be proud of their actions. These Democrat voters showed just how much they care about the voting process and the issues facing our country. The Republicans should learn now to fear just how unhappy the Democrats truly are with the way they have been running our country into the ground for the previous seven years. We will see them again in November and they can count on big changes in our state and our country.

As Hillary R. Clinton said in her last email, “This is our time, this is our place, and this is our chance.” And it is our time, our place and our chance to make history no matter which candidate we choose for president because both have huge support in the Democratic Party to make the needed changes that will move our country in a new and better direction for all Americans.

Just one last note, while we Democrats retain the right to complain at our own party chair for not foreseeing the higher voter turnout. The Republican Party should be very careful just what they say about him. If they feel the overpowering need to criticize someone then they should look to the oval office. I am sure that there is plenty to criticize in their own party.