From Albuquerque to Amsterdam

Written by: Guest Writer on May 22, 2004 6:43 PM EDT

Page writes:

I first read about Howard Dean in the Seattle publication, The Stranger. It was a story about a vibrant, intelligent, moderate Presidential candidate who was also anti-war. I was intrigued and thrilled. On June 28, 2003, I joined 3,000 other Dean supporters at my first Dean rally in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and I left thinking "I will do everything in my power to help this man." I managed to balance my graduate work in chemistry with doing anything and everything I could do for his campaign. I had my "15 minutes of fame" on Blog for America when I joined up with a Seattle Dean supporter to canvas on Mercer Island ("Albuquerque-Seattle Dean Alliance") and the Nov. 7 ("Drive for Democracy").

Frank writes:

Ever since Bush became president of the United States in 2001, I had been following US politics more closely than usual. I was worried about the direction his administration was taking the country in, and the effects of its disastrous foreign policy. I was disappointed to not find much Democratic resistance to his policies. Until, at the start of 2003, I read an article about Howard Dean speaking out against the obviously impending Iraq war.

I was happy to see a Democrat stand up for what he believed in, and started following his campaign. When Blog for America came online, I made my first blog comment shortly afterwards, on June 17th (here), becoming the first foreigner to comment.

Initially, I hesitated to comment more, since I was a foreigner. However, I was welcomed warmly, so I gradually started commenting more, and became a regular on the blog, inspired by the energy and hope of the Dean campaign.
Page writes:

In July 2003, I discovered an online political chat room frequented by many Dean supporters. A guy from Amsterdam started to join the chat, under the name "Frank_in_A-dam". I was intrigued that a European was so very passionate about the Dean campaign – not to mention he was funny and intelligent. When I was volunteering for Dean in Claremont, New Hampshire, for two weeks over my winter break, Frank and I talked on the phone for the first time.

The rest is history. Frank came to visit me in Albuquerque over my spring break, and I still can't believe that I've met the love of my life through the Dean campaign.

Frank writes:

Since I will be in the United States regularly this year to be with Page, I will be able to follow the elections closely. As a European, I really hope that a sense of normalcy can be restored to a country that has been a very good friend of ours for a long time, but is given an increasingly bad name by the Bush adminstration.

We both believe that Democracy for America can play an important role by making sure that the Democratic party will have candidates at all levels who care about people, and will stand up for what they believe in. And we know that it can play a part in electing Democratic presidents, whose administrations will once again work with their allies as friends are supposed to. This time it will not be Howard Dean who will be president, but please make sure it is the Democratic nominee, and not George W. Bush.

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