On Monday, Democracy for America declared Jerry McNerney it's newest Grassroots All-Star. Shortly thereafter, the management at Kos and MyDD added Jerry to their Combined Netroots Endorsement list. He's still fighting for a top 5 spot in the western division Mark Warner's Map Changers competition, which ends Friday - currently, he's in 2nd place, behind only Montana's venerable Jon Tester. If you haven't voted for him there yet, do it! So, what does this all mean? It means that Markos Moulitsas, Chris Bowers, Matt Stoller, DavidNYC, Mark Warner's homies, and a whole big load of DFA's membership think that Jerry's the real deal.

So now what?

The McNerney campaign has been running its afterburners nonstop for months. First they had to beat DLC darling Steve Filson in the Democratic primary earlier this month. Immediately afterward, he had to accelerate in two weeks from practically zero national name recognition to the top of DFA's list of already established netroots celebrities. It was damn fine practice for November, when he'll be executing the same charge against Richard Pombo's 8-term entrenchments. But to break through to the finish, Jerry's going to need to pull out the big guns. The thing is, he doesn't have them. You do.

When we "endorsed" Jerry McNerney last week, we were expressing our confidence in his candidacy. Such an endorsement in word is a fine starting point. Without it, the next step would not be possible. The next step is endorsement in deed. Jerry needs our help. His coffers are drained. The top slot ad on DailyKos cost $4,200 for a one week run. As of May 17th, Jerry had $61,000 cash on hand. He spent 7% of his reserves just publicizing himself to us. What's he going to need to get his name out to his district?

It's time to show what we're made of. Right now, what Jerry needs is money. That's not always going to be what they need, but right now it is. After the DFA endorsement, they reset their fundraising goal to $200,000 by the end of the quarter, this Friday, June 30th. Right now, they've got not quite $150,000. If they can get there, it shows the DCCC and the institutional donors that this guy's going somewhere. If they don't, it tells those guys that a contribution may just be pissing into the wind. If Jerry's going to beat Pombo, he needs to get a running start. He needs your donations now. He needs them so he can get the big money donations after that. He needs the big money so he can get his name recognition up. He needs to get his name recognition up so he can beat Richard Pombo. It's a very simple 4-step process, and it won't work if we let him down on step one. Taking out Pombo starts with your $20, $30, $50, $1000, or whatever you can throw in the pot. And stick an extra 11 cents on the end to let `em know where you came from. Let's show `em what a real Netroots Endorsement looks like.