I'm spending my weekend at the Young Elected Officials Conference, a project of People for the American Way Foundation, which brings together over a hundred young elected progressive officials from all branches of local and state government and connects them. It's a vital step in what we often talk about, building the bench of future progressive leaders.

Tonight's opening session featured PFAW President Ralph Neas, Gerald McEntee the President of AFSCME, and the dinner keynote speaker was Congressman Tim Ryan (seen to right with YEO President and Tallahasse Commisioner Andrew Gillum)

Congressman Ryan gained notoriety and many fans in the blogosphere for his powerful October 2004 speech on the house floor (see below).

Doing my best to channel Jonathan Singer, I approached the congressman before his speech, and interviewed him for a few minutes for the good folks at MyDD.

I started by asking the congressman about how life in the new congress was like. It's "a lot more fun than the last congress" he said and noted that it's an adjustment because its a "different mindset" leading than being in the minority. But that in the majority "tough decisions have to be made" but "the strength of the democratic caucus is its diversity of opinion."

I asked him about the Employee Free Choice Act that recently passed in the House and he noted that while he was happy, "the Senate is a whole different animal."

He noted that, as he has said many times, labor has to change too in the global economy but this (card check) is a tool for them to fairly compete today.

I asked him what was might be coming up that we should keep our eye out for in Congress and he said that he hoped for some "innovative policy." He pointed out that on the Appropriations Committee on which he serves, chaired by David Obey, is holding hearings on "what is America going to look like in 10 years, What problems are we going to face in 10 years."

I asked about, with Obamas recent visit to Ohio, how it felt to have Ohio back in the spotlight for the presidential race in 2008. He laughed and said "its tiring" and jokingly asked them all to "come back next year." But he said he was excited for 08, particularly with the recent election of statewide democrats like Sherrod Brown and Ted Strickland.

One of the thing he later spoke about in his speech was that "anytime in our country's history...where there are two competing ideas...[it has] always been the progressive who were able to capture the center again."

It seemed as thought he was not speaking about "moving towards the center" but about realigning America with progressive ideals.

All in all it was a very cool little interview, with apologies please note all quotes were scrawled in my bad handwriting or rapidly transcribed while he was speaking, so they may be a bit off (Singer makes this look really easy).

I'll be popping in with an update here or there this weekend from this conference, thought it's not as exciting as those guerrilla blogging CPAC (like MBH, Campus Progress, and The Nation)

And because it's awesome, the famous Tim Ryan speech.