Tag: Pennsylvania

FREE-FLOATING ANXIETY 96 HOURS BEFORE THE VOTE

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I am so nervous I can barely breathe.  We’re going canvassing again Sunday and I will try to do more phone calls before then and after but seeing these polls closing – listening to Chuck Todd on MSNBC talk about states that are "tightening" – it’s really scary.  I’ve felt all along that everyone is putting this election away way too soon.  As I sat with friends and listened to Joe Trippi this week, all three of us were troubled by the seeming assumption that the race is "in the bag."  It’s so easy to get complacent and stay home, make fewer calls, do a bit less, if you think things are going your way anyway.

In addition, we don’t know what the "young people" and first-time voters will do.   Will they show up? Can they translate quotes like this one from college student Lauren Masterson, on the NewsHour:

"We see ourselves in him, I think. Even though he is of another generation, people are excited about him because he
seems to understand young people.

into turning out and waiting in line and casting that vote?  Here’s a nice consideration of younger voters and their commitment.

I suppose if I just watched TNT and the endless, comforting Law and Order broadcasts instead of MSNBC, Your Place for Politics,  I’d feel better but after all the years I spent covering campaigns, I can’t imagine avoiding information when it’s available.  And it’s really the first presidential election where I’ve had no editorial responsibility (except my blog) so I have all these habits and nowhere to put them.  I have to sit and listen and worry and watch and bounce from website to website, and to the links provided by friends on Twitter.  Can’t stop.  It’s not that I think I’ll miss the Important Moment, it’s that I keep hoping to hear some good news.  We all know that races tighten at the end but many states are moving into the margin of error and that’s really scary. 

At least I have to go offline for Shabbat, which is going to make me nuts but may be healthy.  Keep an eye on things for me, will you?

 

CANVASSING FOR OBAMA: ARE YOU STRONG OR LEANING? THE OBAMA-MCCAIN RACE FROM THE GROUND FLOOR

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That’s my four year old friend, his dad and our friend Lea at the door of a home in Virginia.  We spent Sunday afternoon canvassing for Obama and the down ticket races in this housing development whose residents had names from Gomez to Kim to Ilbibi to Hussein to Brady.*  These were town homes with small back gardens, beautifully kept and facing out onto mini-wooded areas that made it feel peaceful and apart.  Not fancy, just well-designed and executed. Plastic bikes and push toys sat out in  the open; we even saw some skateboards left leaning against a tree.  Not too much worry about theft, apparently.                           

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As we walked, I realized that this – these homes occupied by families of so many backgrounds, were part of what we were campaigning for: the opportunity of all Americans
building their lives to find a place – a home — a life.  And that the battle, underneath the craziness, is about the best way to guarantee those rights — and possiblities – to more of us.

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The past week or two have been painful for Obama supporters.  Polls are down, Sarah Palin seems to have hijacked much of the campaign, the McCainies are attacking and the attacks, however vicious or frivolous they may be, (and the are) seem to be sticking.  That’s what drove me to Virginia Sunday.  In all my years around politics I’ve never done field work; for most campaigns I’ve been a reporter and during those years I was scrupulously careful to remain neutral and apart.  Now though, I’m out of the news business and I can campaign.  And so Sunday I was  walking around Virginia with three friends, a water bottle and a clipboard.  Our assignment: talk to the folks on our list, find out if they’ve decided for whom they will vote and check the right boxes.  We check Strong, Lean, Undecided.  If they support our guy, we make sure they’re registered and ask if they want to volunteer. 

We didn’t really meet anyone we could try to convert and in our 57 stops we hit lots of "not home" — it was Sunday afternoon after all, and the rest were either for Obama or "We’re for the other guy — you’ve come to the wrong house."  The lack of conversion candidates didn’t matter though because we were mostly building a  registration and GOTV (Get Out the Vote) list that will be accurate and useful on election day.  The coolest moment: meeting an 18-year-old first-time voter– I suspect a first-generation American and clearly excited to be voting for Barack Obama.

*I’m using names of the same ethnicity but not the real ones; that feels too intrusive.

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