—Rep. Ryan Winkler, DFL, District, 44B, Golden Valley

—Rep. Al Juhnke, DFL, District 13B, Willmar

— Kevin Watterson, public affairs director, House Republican Caucus

—U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, Republican, Sixth Congressional District

—Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak

—Tom Horner, Independence Party candidate for governor

—Stephanie Schriock, EMILY’s List president, on former Franken staffer joining her organization

—Wellstone Action on Lynda Waddington, of our sister site, the Iowa Independent

Greta Bergstrom and Ryan Greenwood, of TakeAction Minnesota

In 2007, the board of TakeAction Minnesota’s political action committee gathered at the group’s St. Paul office to discuss a seemingly far-off event: the 2010 governor’s race. The discussion turned, inevitably, to the futility of DFL candidates in recent decades. Not since Rudy Perpich won the 1986 contest has a Democrat triumphed in a gubernatorial campaign in Minnesota.

The scope of that electoral drought became painfully evident when an informal census was taken to see how many of the dozen or so people present had ever voted for a successful gubernatorial candidate. The conclusion: only two of the board members had experienced the novel thrill of casting a ballot for a candidate who actually became governor.

“I was just stunned,” recalls Roy Magnuson, one of those two. “These are people with a history of activism. But you’ve got to go back a ways.”

Indeed you’d have to be over 40 years old to have cast a ballot for Perpich. Democrats have only been shut out from the state’s top post longer in Utah, South Dakota and North Dakota.

That discussion, in part, has led to a novel organizing campaign that TakeAction Minnesota hopes will finally lead to the end of that drought in 2010. Since January the progressive advocacy group has been holding meetings with people across the state. The topic of discussion: What’s your vision for the state of Minnesota?

“What we wanted to get to was people’s guts,” says Mark Schultz, a board member of the group’s political action committee. “We used phrases like convictions and values.”

On Saturday, TakeAction Minnesota will unveil that vision during a gathering at St. Paul’s Arlington High School. It’s the kickoff event for the group’s “Renew Minnesota” campaign, which it hopes will result in the election of the first progressive governor in more than two decades. The vision statement is not a political platform with specific policy prescription, but more of a philosophical framework for discussing the governor’s race.

“It’s kind of a holistic belief system or world view that is very different from Tim Pawlenty’s world view,” says Greta Bergstrom, TakeAction’s communications director. “The era of individual, do-it-on-my-own, pull-myself-up by my bootstraps, has failed miserably. Our state is much worse off.”

Ryan Greenwood, the organization’s political director, says that they heard similar themes as they traveled the state, even if the specific issues of importance varied.

“When we talk with people in Wabasso out in southwest Minnesota, they care about how public policy is supporting family farmers,” Greenwood says. “Maybe that’s not first on the list for somebody in Woodbury. But the themes that come out of that are people start to realize we’re all in this together as a state. There’s actually a profound connection between folks who live in Woodbury and those family farmers out in Wabasso. And that’s true for folks on the Red Lake reservation and people at a senior center in Rochester.”

Four years ago, TakeAction Minnesota was still a fledgling organization, the result of a merger between Progressive Minnesota and Minnesota Alliance for Progressive Action. But it has quickly emerged as a significant force in progressive politics, helping Democrats strengthen their majorities in the state House and Senate during the last two election cycles, and adding organizing muscle to Al Franken’s U.S. Senate campaign. An indicator of that clout: all 11 potential DFL gubernatorial candidate’s will be at Saturday’s gathering.

But the gubernatorial campaign represents the first time that TakeAction has sought to have a major influence on a statewide contest from its inception. While the Renew Minnesota campaign is purposefully eschewing talk of candidates and electoral politics in its early stages, the process will ultimately result in the group’s members voting on which candidate in the field to endorse. The outcome of that endorsement battle could then have a major influence on the outcome of the DFL convention in June.

“The DFL endorsement in this very crowded governor’s race is a really important step for a number of the candidates,” says Jeff Blodgett, executive director of Wellstone Action. “The TakeAction effort is potentially a really powerful force in influencing who the DFL chooses to put up as their candidate.”

Theories abound as to why the DFL has spent so much time in the gubernatorial wilderness. Blodgett argues that the party has devoted too much time to worrying about the impact of third-party candidates and wooing independents, rather than mobilizing its base.

“We have to inspire them,” he says. “Our last four or five candidate have failed to do that.”

Magnuson believes it comes down to a fundamental problem: poor candidates. “The Republicans turn the wheel a little better,” he says. They always seem to have a fresh-looking candidate who makes people think they have fresh ideas.”

Whatever the reason for the electoral malaise, TakeAction is hoping that its lengthy organizing process will change the dynamic in 2010. In addition to seeking input from Minnesota residents about their vision for the state, the group is also asking participants to commit to helping elect a progressive governor and then assist in pushing a legislative agenda. The commitments can be simply talking to friends and neighbors about the governor’s race, or participating in next year’s DFL caucus process. The hope is that when the party’s nominee is finally selected there will be a cadre of volunteers ready to put sweat equity into the campaign and beyond.

“It’s not enough to just tell a candidate here’s what we want from you,” says Greenwood. “We have to be willing to say here’s the work we’re going to do to help you win an election and to help you govern after you win an election to enact this vision. This is a group of  people who are willing to do the work, who are committed to making this happen.”

Harkin bills his event as a stop for Democrats on their way up: In 2007 the event’s speakers included, among other Democratic presidential wannabes, a first-term U.S. Senator from Illinois named Barack Obama.

This year it’s another first-term senator from a neighboring state — who, after all, has written a book about becoming president – but Al Franken denies that visions of the White House are dancing in his eyes:

I guess that most people who speak at the Steak Fry eventually run for president. I guess that’s been the history but I’m not interested in running for president. I’m coming because I like Tom Harkin and I like steak.

Franken is also co-host at another event this afternoon: a send-off in Minneapolis for Sam and Sylvia Kaplan. The DFL activists and benefactors are relocating to Morocco, where Sam will serve as U.S. ambassador. If Franken is to make it back to Minneapolis for the 4–6 p.m. cocktail reception for the Kaplans, a fundraiser for Wellstone Action, he’ll have to fly. Indianola is a good four hours by car down I-35W.

Here’s the video feed from the Harkin Steak Fry, which should be live from 2:30–3:30 p.m. via iowademocrats.org, which also promises live blogging all day. At the bottom of the post, for your off-hour viewing pleasure (in case you haven’t heard him speak lately), are clips from Obama’s 2007 Steak Fry speech.

Obama at 2007 Harkin Steak Fry, part 1:

Obama at 2007 Harkin Steak Fry, part 2:

Update: Here are the first videos of Franken in Iowa to surface on YouTube:

Wellstone Action, a group that carries on grassroots organizing work in the late Minnnesota senator’s name, distributed this video via Twitter today. In it, Wellstone talks about building grassroots leaders to create “a citizen politics that can beat a big money politics.”

If we’re going to have the kind of change in our country that’ll make the United States of America a better America, I guarantee you it’ll be the result of much more grassroots politics … I think we need to get our values out there, I think we need to get an exciting, bold agenda out there, and then I think we need to do a better job of doing the grassroots organizing and building our leadership. That’s the way we’re going to make the change in the country.

Here is the video:

Four years ago, the same candidate-training program did the trick for three other council hopefuls who went on to win election later that year. The best-known graduates of Camp Wellstone’s January 2005 session are U.S. Rep. Tim Walz, now in his second term representing Minnesota’s First District, and Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, who has gained a national profile during the recent U.S. Senate election recount.

But it’s the local victories by three members the Camp Wellstone Class of 2005 — Minneapolis City Council members Ralph Remington, Diane Hofstede and Elizabeth Glidden — that offer the most direct inspiration to council aspirants from this year’s camp: Charley Underwood, Doron Clark and Kenya McKnight.

All three find themselves in crowded fields: Underwood in Ward 12, the last to send a Republican to the council; Clark in Ward 1, where the retirement of DFL incumbent Paul Ostrow is creating one of three open council seats this year; and McKnight in Ward 5, where a number of others are also said to be mulling efforts to oust DFL incumbent Don Samuels.

Two others attended the recent candidate camp with the Minneapolis City Council in mind. Charles Carlson just announced that he has dropped out of contention for the DFL endorsement in Ward 2 for the seat now held by the council’s lone Green Party member, Cam Gordon. And Peter Eichten said last month he was still considering whether to enter the Ward 9 race as the second Green Party challenger (after Dave Bicking) to Gary Schiff, the DFL incumbent.

Carlson had been looking to get farther than Bill Svrluga, a 2005 Camp Wellstone grad who vied for but didn’t win the DFL endorsement in Ward 2 that year. Svrluga’s fellow camper Kevin McDonald took his race all the way to the November 2005 general election, when he drew nearly 40 percent of the votes in the city’s 12th ward, losing to DFL incumbent Sandy Colvin Roy.

This year Colvin Roy faces another newly minted Camp Wellstone grad in Underwood, who tells the Minnesota Independent he’s now been through all three tracks the camp has to offer. He completed the campaign-staffer track while working on Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer‘s 2006 bid for Congress, and later the track for citizen activists.

That’s the role Underwood says comes most naturally. This is his first time running as a candidate himself since he lost the race for Macalester College student body president in 1968 to Tim O’Brien, now a well-known author.

But three days of role-playing over the last weekend in January primed Underwood for tasks like phoning for campaign donations. That chore got easier for Underwood with this Camp Wellstone advice: “Ask for a certain amount of money, then pick up your coffee cup. Let the silence be there. Don’t bargain them down.”

McKnight concurs: “I enjoyed the hands-on learning, which helped me become much more comfortable with my approach talking with people, my 90-second speech. … It was a great start for me.”

For weeks leading up to the March 3 precinct caucuses, candidates spend evening after evening dialing not only for dollars but also for the support of prospective delegates. Once elected on Caucus Night, DFL Party delegates will choose candidates at ward conventions held later this month, with contenders for citywide offices (including mayor and at-large park commissioners) selected at the city convention in the spring.

The Green and Republican parties conduct parallel processes, though they’re conducted in a much more compact manner than those of the DFL.

Camp Wellstone is part of the St. Paul-based organization Wellstone Action (named for the late Sen. Paul Wellstone and his wife, Sheila), which offers eight training programs in all. Communications Director Elana Wolowitz says the camps are held throughout the year and across the country, often at the request of local groups. Since 2006, more than 300 Camp Wellstone alums have won elective office.

Wolowitz says most participants are progressive-minded, and the organization describes itself as progressive — but also nonpartisan and non-ideological, with at least one Independence Party candidate on its graduation rolls.

Might wound-licking Republicans now flock to Camp Wellstone for tips? Wolowitz is dubious, since conservatives have their own institutes — on which Camp Wellstone is modeled in part.

Graduates are more likely to run into each other in places like Minneapolis where the two-party system means DFLers and Greens. Underwood, a DFLer who counts many Greens among his circle of friends and fellow activists, says it’s only by chance that no city council race this year pits two Camp Wellstone grads against each other.