So yeah, I went to the convention yesterday and I lived to tell the tale!
The Oklahoman story Former state lawmaker to head Oklahoma Democrats describes how a credentialing problem led to a long delay and ultimate redo of the vote for party chair (while taking every opportunity possible to mention the past unsuccessful campaigns of the various candidates.
As my first major party state convention, I thought it was pretty good, except for the excruciating three hour gap of confusion and intrigue (and drinking and other diversions) in the middle. But if the Oklahoman is correct, in 1999 a similar discrepancy was just glossed over and allowed to stand, so with that info, I withdraw all my griping of yesterday, since I don’t think anyone can say the vote wasn’t fair, and I’m quite happy with the outcome, since the Wallace/Orwig team consists of my #1 and #2 picks for chair. I think the party machinery moved significantly to the left, putting it more in line with its grassroots activists, which will hopefully lead to even more contributions from them in time and money, which are needed.
OK County’s original vote count (all these counts are 5th District only since I didn’t realize till later that parts of OK County were being counted in 4th CD):
Troy Green 0
Leroy D Downs 3
Dana Orwig 39
Wallace Collins 38
Mannix Barnes 19
Jed Green 6On the revote, and after Troy and Jed dropped out and endorsed Collins:
Leroy D Downs 1
Dana Orwig 40
Wallace Collins 47
Mannix Barnes 18Runoff (voting began at 5:35):
Dana Orwig 44
Wallace Collins 57
Final statewide count (5:50)
Dana Orwig 213
Wallace Collins 326
Wallace gave a simple and blessedly short acceptance speech, we moved on to the election of Vice Chair, but I had already stayed two hours longer than I really could, so I left at that point.
From other online sources, I learned that in addition to Dana Orwig at Vice Chair, David Ratcliffe was elected Secretary and Donna Russel Treasurer. Since I believe this is an all-caucasion slate, the Affirmative Action postitions are all the more important. They are:
Male: Carl Downing and George Young
Female: Denay Burris and Nicole Kirkpatrick
Still haven’t heard about the resolutions.
Update [5/15/2011 8:35pm]:
I have been informed by a member of the Young Democrats that “Resolutions will be heard by Central Comm b/c we lost quorum before they could be considered.”