The National Welfare Rights Organization 1966 - 1975

An outgrowth of the Civil Rights Movement: Women of Color Rising to lift themselves and their children out of poverty.

Join the Global Black Caucus for an insightful webinar, during Black History Month 2023, and learn more about the significance of the National Welfare Rights Organization and its activism and legacy which still carries on today.  

February 11, 2023, at 10:00 AM EST / 16:00 PM CET / 23:00 HKT 

This webinar is facilitated by Miriam Victory Spiegel, Democrats Abroad Switzerland, born in 1945 in New York City, long-time activist, Community Organizer in New York 1968 – 1980, and Couples and Family Therapist, in Zürich, Switzerland since 1990.

During this webinar, Miriam will begin her presentation by focussing on the events that she experienced as an activist and community organizer in New York City in 1968. She will describe the theoretical basis of the creation of the National Welfare Rights Organization and its inception within the framework of the Civil Rights Movement. To contextualize, she will share a rearview mirror with us, looking back and trying to understand why so many people of color were left behind in mid-sixties America and seemed doomed to a life of poverty, limited education, poor health, and unemployment. These reflections will take us on a historical journey beginning in 1619 and ending in 1968….

This event is being co-sponsored by the Global Women's Caucus.

Join us for an insightful webinar on February 11, 2023, at 10:00 AM EST / 16:00 PM CET / 23:00 HKT 

As we are already gearing up for the next election cycle, please consider making a donation to help get out the vote in 2024. We can not win the Presidential Election without you!

Donate today at: https://www.democratsabroad.org/bc-donations

Join us for our bi-weekly meeting as we plan for 2023 and 2024. Our meetings are on a rotating schedule so that we can include people from all regions.

We need volunteers in these areas:

• Intercom
• Facebook group/social media
• Graphics
• Event planners
• Newsletter team
• More tech people
• Phone bankers
• Ohio Outreach
• Database management/Clerical

RSVP to receive the Zoom link to join the meeting.

Join us for our bi-weekly meeting as we plan for 2023 and 2024. Our meetings are on a rotating schedule so that we can include people from all regions.

We need volunteers in these areas:

• Intercom
• Facebook group/social media
• Graphics
• Event planners
• Newsletter team
• More tech people
• Phone bankers
• Ohio Outreach
• Database management/Clerical

RSVP to receive the Zoom link to join the meeting.

Join us for our bi-weekly meeting as we plan for 2023 and 2024. Our meetings are on a rotating schedule so that we can include people from all regions.

We need volunteers in these areas:

• Intercom
• Facebook group/social media
• Graphics
• Event planners
• Newsletter team
• More tech people
• Phone bankers
• Ohio Outreach
• Database management/Clerical

Please note the time has changed in North America.

RSVP to receive the Zoom link to join the meeting.

Join us for our bi-weekly meeting as we plan for 2023 and 2024. Our meetings are on a rotating schedule so that we can include people from all regions.

We need volunteers in these areas:

• Intercom
• Facebook group/social media
• Graphics
• Event planners
• Newsletter team
• More tech people
• Phone bankers
• Ohio Outreach
• Database management/Clerical

RSVP to receive the Zoom link to join the meeting.

Join us for our bi-weekly meeting as we plan for 2023 and 2024. Our meetings are on a rotating schedule so that we can include people from all regions.

We need volunteers in these areas:

• Intercom
• Facebook group/social media
• Graphics
• Event planners
• Newsletter team
• More tech people
• Phone bankers
• Ohio Outreach
• Database management/Clerical

RSVP to receive the Zoom link to join the meeting.

There’s more to DAGR than may meet the eye. We’ll be featuring the members who keep things running, in the hopes more of us will want to help out. We’re starting with GOTV (Get Out The Vote … which in DAGR is also part of the Membership task.)

“Play it where it lays” is bad grammar but a fitting phrase to dive into Charity Moschopoulos’ roles as a DAGR volunteer. Her trajectory of the last 15 years spans responsibilities, some easier, some harder. Charity’s Girl Scout mom experience led to “the red hat” for visibility when she led the Greeting/Guiding team for the 2009 Obama Inaugural at ACS. That was before she gave one to the DAGR chair for the 2015 July-4^th picnic, and long before that grifter guy stole the idea and printed MAGA on a gazillion.

Annual General Assembly and Elections
Wednesday, January 18 at 7 pm
Online via the ZOOM platform
AND
in-person at Athens Hard Rock Café

In accordance with DAGR Bylaws, the Annual General Meeting (AGM) is held each year in the first quarter (by 31 March), but in an election year the deadline is January 31^st.  In the odd-numbered years, DAGR elects officers for the coming 2-year term.

This year’s AGM and Election is scheduled for Wednesday, January 18 at 7 pm (19:00) at Hard Rock Café Athens AND online through ZOOM

Voters wait to feed their ballots into an optical scanning machine

1984 or so, Fisherman’s Wharf in Columbus, Greek Nite. Joining us every month or so was the executive team from Borden’s: Al, Peter, and Tash. Peter, who had been on the team that developed Elmer’s glue, had Cefalonian roots. Tash had a penchant for club singing and was actually quite good at the mic. And then there was the old sage, Al. Some current panic over nuclear war or enviro disaster was in the air, and Al said, wisely, peppering it with examples from the Dark Ages and before, that mankind had always confronted plagues and disasters that were sure to wipe out the human race. And yet, we’d always overcome them when science and logic kicked in. I look back on his assurance with hope. ~KL

If democracy succeeds on mutual trust, then planting seeds of doubt is the first step at brushing that pesky people’s choice aside. And, there are a lot of seeds being planted this year. It bears a closer look.

Here's how ...

If you're a U.S. citizen or dual-national in Greece, you have the right to vote from abroad in the 2022 midterm elections and every election. If you are or will be 18 on Nov 8, 2022, you can vote in the upcoming elections.

Εάν είστε πολίτης των ΗΠΑ ή διπλή υπήκοος στην Ελλάδα, έχετε το δικαίωμα να ψηφίσετε από το εξωτερικό στις ενδιάμεσες εκλογές του 2022 και σε κάθε εκλογή. Εάν είστε ή θα είστε 18 ετών στις 8 Νοεμβρίου 2022, μπορείτε να ψηφίσετε στις επερχόμενες εκλογές.

As a U.S. citizen, you can register to vote from abroad while living, working, or traveling overseas by submitting one form, the Federal Post Card Application (FPCA). It doesn't matter if you were registered to vote before you left the U.S. or how long you have lived outside the U.S. (including if you've never resided there).

Ως πολίτης των ΗΠΑ, μπορείτε να εγγραφείτε για να ψηφίσετε από το εξωτερικό ενώ ζείτε, εργάζεστε ή ταξιδεύετε στο εξωτερικό υποβάλλοντας ένα έντυπο, την Αίτηση Ομοσπονδιακής Ταχυδρομικής Κάρτας (FPCA). Δεν έχει σημασία αν είχατε εγγραφεί για να ψηφίσετε πριν φύγετε από τις Η.Π.Α. ή πόσο καιρό έχετε ζήσει εκτός των Η.Π.Α. (συμπεριλαμβανομένου του αν δεν έχετε διαμείνει ποτέ εκεί).
ΔΕΝ ΓΙΝΕΤΑΙ ΠΡΟΣΩΠΙΚΗ ΨΗΦΟΦΟΡΙΑ στην Ελλάδα στην Πρεσβεία ή στο Προξενείο για τις εκλογές του Νοεμβρίου 2022! Κάντε κύλιση προς τα κάτω για να βρείτε τις οδηγίες στην Eλληνική γλώσσα.
 

Into the Deep Muddy: The making of a Facebook daily-change graphic

It was a hot, humid night in July, 2018. The midterms were looming and DA global was looking for ways to excite the abroad members. The regional EMEA meeting murmured that a countdown graphic of some sort would help build the buzz.

by Janet Karvouniaris
July 21, 2002

Ed. Note: It was a brief exchange with Janet that set Karen Lee off on the ‘What Are the Pundits On About’ op-ed. They agree, as Janet notes, that 2022 is way too early to be speculating about 2024. It distracts from the very steep task at hand this year. But Janet also sees the other side, the voter ennui and where it may be coming from. There’s a lot of that in the US, and it dampens our enthusiasm abroad when we read the news feeds. Here’s a first salvo at identifying root causes.

No Real News, Just a Biden to Punch

So, the top question on our minds is ‘Who should we run in 2024?’
But shouldn’t we be asking, instead, ‘What should we do in 2022 to make sure our votes are counted in 2024?’

How we feel about the politics of the day, and the Dem party in particular, depends a lot on the ‘trusted sources’ we read. While much is being said about the negative influence of social media – veering away from real discussion, favoring short tweets, inviting nastiness and trolling, spreading disinformation – less has been noted about our mainstream press.

A Retrospective and Discovery

by Gina Billy

Author’s Note: Most members knew Steve Medeiros, long-time DAGR volunteer and board member, vice chair 2015-18 and country chair 2019. I did not. I never met – or even had heard of – Steve during his physical lifetime. So, in order to weave together this portrait of Steve in a way that I hope conveys some of the great richness and beauty of his life, I depended on written records of Steve’s life journey and, most importantly, first-hand accounts from people who had had the joy of experiencing Steve “Live.” ~ Gina Billy

Giannis Boutaris, 2018, courtesy PappasPost

by Kevin Berkowitz

Spend some time talking to people in Thessaloniki, especially cab drivers and the like, and you will hear any number of insults against Giannis Boutaris, the mayor of Thessaloniki from 2011 to 2019. He made a name for himself as a progressive leader in a conservative city. 

By Jeffrey Siger 
As published May 21, 2022 12:00 am on the murderiseverywhere blogspot

Saturday-Jeff

Last Wednesday, I had the great honor of participating on a ZOOM panel sponsored by Democrats Abroad Greece (DAGR) addressing the current surge in book banning. Moderated by former US diplomat and author John Brady Kiesling, the panelists included a MacArthur Award-winning poet (Alicia Stallings), the Poet Laureate of Missouri (Aliki Barnstone), a former DJ with a doctorate from Oxford and a reputation for gifted presentations (Abby Hafer), and a kid from Pittsburgh.

From May 16th and for the foreseeable future, we’ll cease posting to the Thessaloniki Chapter  page and direct readers to check the DAGR main Facebook page and/or join one of our two closed groups, set for DAGR member exchanges of thoughts and comments.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on this, so we can plan “human-cost-effective” outreach into the future. 

Why are we doing this? Well ...

Democrats Abroad Greece 
Annual General Meeting (AGM)
Wednesday, March 30 
Online – 7 pm Greek time

The sixth in the “Kafeneion” series of online events, organized by Democrats Abroad Greece Thessaloniki Chapter on February 16, 2022, with speaker Steven Tagle was very well attended!