Barack Obama is a neighborhood organizer at heart. He knows the importance of getting boots on the ground and talking to people. He wants volunteers to contact every voter in America and personally deliver his message of hope and change. dday wrote a diary about how Obama’s strategy is not about top down messaging through national ads. He is not trying to change minds en masse but one voter at a time, one contact at a time. Obama is counting on winning through registering new voters and getting them to the polls. Now we have to ask the question, "Will these new voters show up to vote for Obama?"
Warning: This is a rant. More Strong language below the fold
I waited till midnight to push the button to publish this. I'm up past my bedtime - and I'm still angry enough to take the plunge. I'll go back to writing saner diaries another day, or maybe writing no diaries at all, but I would be dishonest if I just sat on my hands and didn't share how I'm feelin' right about now. So here it goes.
Recently, a fair number of high-profile progressive bloggers have been, to put it mildly, flipping out about Barack Obama's campaign style and his chances in November. Josh Marshall thinks there need to be consistent lines of attack against McCain. John Aravosis thinks Team Obama is in a bubble and this is feeling like the Democratic campaigns of the past. Matt Stoller thinks it's time for message testing to find the attack that'll work on McCain.
All of these are smart people who want Obama to win and see it slipping away. But they are failing to totally account for the X factor of the election, which is going virtually unmentioned throughout the blogosphere - the historic ground effort that the Obama campaign is banking on to win. It is not without peril, but it is a very new thing, and I think we have to understand it if we want to understand the twists and turns of this election.
It's no accident that poblano has been doing such an outstanding job calling and tracking the races. People here treat politics the way baseball fanatics memorize baseball stats. I mention this because it is important for us to remember how skewed our perspective is when we are out and about talking to undecided voters. I mention this because if you have the right mindset you will be amazed how many opportunities you will have to advocate for Obama. I'm not talking about accosting folks and pinning them down. I'm talking about making it easy for people to solicit you for your opinion.
Those are critical opportunities that pay huge dividends. I just laid the groundwork today that will probably bring in several votes. With a minimal amount of effort, you can do this too.
This diary is entirely inspired by a conversation my sister overheard this morning at one of the Obama campaign sites here in Albuquerque. She was there picking up tickets for Obama's town hall that will be held here Monday.
Don't get me wrong. I have the utmost respect for campaign volunteers and paid campaign workers. It is a hard, and sometimes, thankless job. I especially respect those that have left their families, friends and lives behind to travel to a new state to work.
My words are not meant to chastise but rather to inform. This is the most important election of our lives. Please listen.
After Kos quoted a CQ article that mentioned McCain hasn't opened a single field office in North Carolina yet, I thought, "You've gotta be kidding me." Well, looks like I read right.
By late July, Obama had 11 campaign offices in the state. McCain, who coasted to a 74 percent win in a primary held two months after he had clinched the Republican nomination, was still (as of midsummer) coordinating his North Carolina campaign out of a regional office in Tallahassee, Fla. (emphasis mine)
So let's get this straight. You've got a state Shrub won by double-digits in both 2000 and 2004, hasn't had one poll showing a double-digit McCain lead since February--and McCain's running his field operations for this state out of freaking Florida? You'll have to pardon us North Carolinians while we chuckle.
I've heard it said, and seen it written: The voter rolls in New Mexico were purged, and it's gonna sabotage the election. The implication is that something nefarious has happened. I decided to test it out. With a mini-audit on one precinct that I know well. I worked it in 2004 in detail, and still have the files.
I went through Taos County, Precinct 13 (Taos Pueblo Indian Reservation) - comparing the voter rolls from Election Day 2004 with today. My conclusion? Nothing to worry about. Unless something is very different in another part of the state, that is.
Since there are persistent rumors and speculation on this, I thought it would be worth sharing what I found out.
A neighbor and I were out canvassing our neighborhood tonight, in the first blast into our precinct since the primaries. I am tired and wanted to get to sleep, but this is bothering me so much that I thought perhaps I could get some help, via all of the experience represented at here at DailyKos.
I live in a low-income area of a relatively liberal Oregon town. I believe we are still considered a swing state, as Obama's majority may be well under 10%. It is polling under 7% right now, and with all the smears, it could get close.
So, now I come across people who are too progressive to vote for Obama, and a couple of mellow but firm republicans, and I can't sleep. I don't know what to say to convince them to help us to get this thing done. I watched the video about McCain promising more wars, and I can't sleep without asking for your help. More below...
One thing that I think a lot of folks have been missing in recent days regarding John McCain's chances in this election is that John McCain's campaign will not be even close to as organized, dedicated and systematic in GOTV operations as George W. Bush's 2000 and 2004 campaigns.
I think you may be missing a key element of McCain's strategy. Remember, he has NO national ground game to counter Obama's vaunted field organization. No Bush-style 72 hour GOTV operation, no large and disciplined staff -- just a small core staff and media operation. In order to win without a ground game he literally has to destroy Obama as a viable alternative -- it isn't enough to just get close. That means the ads will be harder edged, more plentiful and more relentless than we've ever seen.I think Mark McKinnon realized that early on, and didn't want to be the guy to do to Obama what has to be done to win, as that person will become a political scourge (a la Atwater) when all is said and done, even if it works.
I am an attorney in Texas, a max donor to the Obama campaign and a precinct captain here in H-town. I live in one of the more progressive areas in Texas. We delivered our state senate district something like 70:30 for Obama, and ensure that DEMS stay in the our city's mayor's office (even though Houston doesn't run on party lines)
As with many of my neighbors, I volunteered for the Obama campaign. In fact, we had an abundance of volunteers when the primary came to town, including 8 "captains" for my precinct alone. Given the situation with my overachieving neighborhood, I assumed that even though I signed up, there was going to be little work I could do for the campaign - other than phone calls and local GOTV/GOTC efforts.
Well, Team Obama proved me wrong (more after the jump)
The Washington Post reported yesterday that GOP operatives in Virginia are raising the spectre of "a very serious and troubling trend" of registration fraud.
In Virginia, as in other states, loads of first-time voters are registering to cast ballots in the fall elections. Through the first six months of this year, 147,000 people, almost half under the age of 25, registered in the commonwealth, a figure that election officials say is unprecedented. As registration drives accelerate, including those run by the Barack Obama campaign and its allies, it's no wonder that Republicans are increasingly anxious about retaining their hold on a state that GOP presidential candidates have carried since 1968. What is surprising is their utterly baseless charge of "coordinated and widespread voter fraud . . . throughout Virginia."
I’m going to go ahead and spend some time writing my own diary today. I’m a little irritated. Well, a lot! I got a few bones to pick all with the same theme.
I’m going to go ahead and start with the ignorant bitchasses that keep saying...
"You’re just voting for Obama because he is black!"
I will try and respond to this without cursing or getting angry.
Since I’m a factual kinda gal, let’s look at the facts.
Think of the number of people that you come into contact with in the average day. When you go about your morning business, when you're on the way to work, when you're at work, on your lunch break, when you're running errands, when you're going shopping.
