Email from John Kerry

I received this email from John Kerry today; I've highlighted a paragraph that jumped off the page for me:

With eight consecutive victories, and a momentum for change that is rolling across the nation -- in caucuses and primaries, East Coast and West Coast, the South and the Midwest, Barack Obama is on the move, smashing the old stereotypes into a million different pieces.

This blew me away: in Barack’s victory in Virginia last night, he won 142,000 more votes than all of the Republicans combined, and his victory margin over Senator Clinton was larger than John McCain’s entire vote total. All of this, in what the Old Guard liked to pretend was "red state" Virginia.

When Barack and I rode together in the motorcade in Charleston, South Carolina on the day I gave him my endorsement, we talked about the three-million-member-strong johnkerry.com community. We both agreed that this email list was a community of supporters, not an ATM machine.

And so these last weeks, as I’ve talked with you, as Barack introduced himself to you, as Ted Kennedy talked about Barack’s commitment to health care for all, and Gov. Tim Kaine talked about Barack’s ability to unite our country -- we haven’t asked you to dig into your pockets. We’ve asked you to get to know Barack, to study his positions, to make phone calls to your neighbors, to go door to door -- to get involved.

But today, I ask you to consider making a contribution as the campaign enters a new phase. Wisconsin, Texas, Ohio, Pennsylvania -- the next big contests in this campaign are big media market states, huge states that are expensive to build statewide field organizations in, and Barack has a lot of ground to make up. To win, Barack can use all of our help....

So there it is. I know not everyone here is an Obama supporter, and diversity of opinion is a strength, not a weakness of our community -- but you’ve "had my back" in so many fights these last years, I knew I could ask you to consider signing up for another mission.

So now I'll add my voice to Kerry's and ask you to consider contributing to Obama's campaign. Together we can make a difference.