The idea of setting up a “Democrats for …” or a “Republicans for …” a candidate of the opposing party is a perennial, and not a bad idea if you’re running as the nominee of the minority party in your area (a “Democrats for Mike Crapo” in Idaho would be, tactically, kinda pointless) and if you’ve got some significant names to throw out there – some well-known, identifiable people who have had some elective office or party organization background.

Such names aren’t often easy to come by. In Idaho, the Keith Allred Democratic campaign did a pretty good job rounding up a string of fairly prominent former Republican legislators (no current ones, though) and others from the local level. How much help that will be isn’t clear, but it doesn’t hurt, and a message is conveyed.

So, turning to the Oregon gubernatorial campaign, it makes sense – in this leaning-blue state – for Republican Chris Dudley to round up some opposition-party people on his behalf. His campaign site has a page of Dems for Dudley.

Two names are listed there. One is Don Alanen of Beaverton, is a third-generation logger who wrote a book called “The Logger’s Encyclopedia: A Road to the Past,” but who so far as we can tell seems not to have been much involved politically. About the other, Sue Diers, we couldn’t find any public profile at all. There is also a video on the page showing a few more endorsements, but those aren’t exactly politically prominent names either.

That’s not to criticize them or make light of their support of Dudley. But does it offer much of a case to suggest a significant core of Democrats are signing up with Dudley? For that, you need some political and party activist people.