"A few years ago this guy would have been getting us coffee."

So says Bill Clinton to Ted Kennedy about then United States Senator and Presidential Candidate Barack Obama.

EDITED TO ADD THIS:

From yesterday's HARDBALL;

In an attempt to persuade Ted Kennedy not to support Obama, Clinton is supposed to have said that :

" A few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee. I guess the ONE-DROP RULE can still trump Harvard Law."

how come they left off the ONE-DROP RULE as part of the quote?


I wrote elsewhere that I wasn't surprised by this. How was I supposed to be surprised by this. Hell, I was one of the founders of the ClintonAttacksObama WIKI. I spent hours upon hours documenting the dog whistles and race-based rhetoric coming towards Barack Obama from the Clinton camp and their allies.

But, I believe this explains the endorsement.

Go back and playback the Kennedy endorsement video:

Teddy was ALL IN.

there was no hesitation; no doubt for him. every fiber of his being thought backing Obama was the right thing to do, and you could SEE it with Ted Kennedy.


We wrote extensively about the dogwhistles coming from Camp Clinton.

Read more »

President-Elect Obama Raised Half a BILLION Dollars Online

So says this story in the Washington Post.

The Clickocracy
Obama Raised Half a Billion Online
By Jose Antonio Vargas

Barack Obama raised half a billion dollars online in his 21-month campaign for the White House, dramatically ushering in a new digital era in presidential fundraising.

In an exclusive interview with The Post, members of the vaunted Triple O, Obama's online operation, broke down the numbers: 3 million donors made a total of 6.5 million donations online adding up to more than $500 million. Of those 6.5 million donations, 6 million were in increments of $100 or less. The average online donation was $80, and the average Obama donor gave more than once.

"You looked at the money being raised online in the same way that you looked at the crowds who came to the rallies," Joe Rospars, the 27-year-old director of Obama's new-media department, told The Post. "You were constantly surprised at the number of people who were coming out to see him," and, when it came to online donations, "people exceeded our expectations as to what they were willing to do."

Obama also raised millions from traditional campaign bundlers -- rich, well-connected fundraisers -- but the bulk of the more than $600 million that Obama raised throughout the campaign was through the Internet, aides said. (Some of those bundlers, of course, also arranged for donations to be made online, so there is some overlap.)

In September, his single biggest month of fundraising, Obama amassed more than 65 percent of his record-shattering haul -- $100 million of the $150 million -- from online donations, aides said. After Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin dismissed the value of community organizing in her acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention on Sept. 3 -- "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities," she said to applause -- Obama raised $10 million within 24 hours.

Read the rest of the article at the link above. The article also contains information about how the Obama campaign used social networking in the campaign. How the revolutionary phonebanking program helped the campaign. I have said for awhile that the Obama Campaign would be one to be studied for years to come, and this article just makes one stand back and go: DAYUM.

Not bad for a ' Community Organizer'.

LOL

Caribou Barbie's Rehabilitation Tour

She ran for Vice-President, but couldn't find the time to sit down seriously with journalists, and NEVER HAD A SINGLE PRESS CONFERENCE, but now that it's all done, she won't leave my tv screen.

I don't believe in kicking someone when they're down, but in her case, I'll make an exception.

The exception will be made because it needs repeating - THIS WOMAN HAD NO BUSINESS BEING PLACED IN NOMINATION.

That's why the whole ' rehabilitation' thing with John McCain is utter BS.

This man, put in place, this woman, who was patently unqualified -to be a heartbeat away from The Presidency of the United States of America.

THAT is how little regard he had for this country.

Andrew Sullivan has ALWAYS gotten it where Caribou Barbie is concerned. And spells it out today:

12 Nov 2008 12:49 pm
Why Palin Still Matters

Some readers think my continuing attempt to expose all the lies and flim-flam and bizarre behavior of Sarah Palin is now moot. She's history - they argue. Move on. I think she probably is history. Even Bill Kristol and his minions in the McCain-Palin campaign may not be able to resuscitate her political viability now. But even if she is history, she is history that matters.

Let's be real in a way the national media seems incapable of: this person should never have been placed on a national ticket in a mature democracy.

She was incapable of running a town in Alaska competently. The impulsive, unvetted selection of a total unknown, with no knowledge of or interest in the wider world, as a replacement president remains one of the most disturbing events in modern American history.

That the press felt required to maintain a facade of normalcy for two months - and not to declare the whole thing a farce from start to finish - is a sign of their total loss of nerve.

That the Palin absurdity should follow the two-term presidency of another individual utterly out of his depth in national government is particularly troubling. 46 percent of Americans voted for the possibility of this blank slate as president because she somehow echoed their own sense of religious or cultural "identity". Until we figure out how this happened, we will not be able to prevent it from happening again. And we have to find a way to prevent this from recurring.

It happened because John McCain is an incompetent and a cynic and reckless beyond measure. To have picked someone he'd only met once before, without any serious vetting procedure, revealed McCain as an utterly unserious character, a man whose devotion to the shallowest form of political gamesmanship trumped concern for his country's or his party's interest.

........................................................................................

She cannot keep even the most trivial story straight; she repeats untruths with a ferocity and calm that is reserved only to the clinically unhinged; she has the educational level of a high school drop-out; and regards ignorance as some kind of achievement. It is excruciating to watch her - but more excruciating to watch those who feel obliged to defend her.

Her candidacy, in short, was indefensible. It remains indefensible. Until the mainstream media, the GOP establishment, and the conservative intelligentsia acknowledge the depth of their error, this blog will keep demanding basic accountability.

People ask why she hasn't been called on the carpet for her obvious lack of qualification. My answer to that is, if the MSM were to do ITS FUCKING JOB NOW, the the question would HAVE TO BE ASKED:

WHY THE HELL DIDN'T YOU TELL US THIS DURING THE CAMPAIGN?

Why the hell didn't you give Sarah Palin the same rectal exam that Barack Obama was subjected to for 2 years? Why didn't, when faced with the obvious:
1. The repeated lies about that Bridge
2. The non-release of the medical records
3. The LIES about her time as Mayor
4. The neon signs saying ' ABUSE OF POWER' going back to Wasilla days
5. The preacher who said truly Anti-Semitic things
6. An actual WITCH HUNTER for a preacher
7. The whole, " I have foreign policy experience because Alaska is near Russia' defense
8. The cesspool that is Alaska Republican politics

DIDN'T YOU DO YOUR DAMN JOB?

See, it's BECAUSE they didn't do their job, you have idiots like Mika B. (MSNBC) trying to justify this woman's existence, because they know damn well that she should have been run out of town, and John McCain bitchslapped for subjecting this country to that woman.

There were some unsung heroes during this farce, with Andrew Sullivan leading the pack. Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric must be counted among them too. In retrospect, their non-hostile questioning is what exposed Caribou Barbie for the fraud that she always was. Mudflats is a hero, because he, along with the Anchorage Daily News, were blunt and honest in telling the lower 48 about McCain's Choice.

And, that's what she always will be: MCCAIN'S CHOICE.

His choice to betray this country. His choice to put this country at risk.

Thank goodness for female intuition, cause it was the women that sunk her.

Hear a Great Public Radio Program - Looking Back At the Past Week

On The Media takes a look at the past weeks events, focusing on the election, the future of the Republican Party, and how the media covered the stories.

Topics include: The Obama victory, Studs Terkel's work, Lee Atwater and the Southern Strategy...and how Karl Rove & The Republican Party carried on the Atwater tradition, The civil war in the Republican Party, and other interesting topics. I was going to post just one or two segments, but realized how much I liked the entire show this week. Listen to the program below.


Mp3 link

See all the topics from this week from the On the Media website.

will.i.am - It's A New Day

The Imagery of Tuesday

I've been trying to put into words what the election meant to me.

It's about images. Doing the Open Thread during the course of this election season, I would search for the image to put into the post. For everyone that I chose, there were dozens that I didn't. But, those images never left me. Images, from across this country of the America that I want to live in. The America where diversity, and cultures are accepted and celebrated.

I have images from Tuesday night.

The image of Grant Park. People of every ethnicity, color, creed, age, sexual orientation, were there together. They were America.

The image of the young Sista at Spelman - collapsed to the floor on her knees, weeping. They went back to her several times, but she never let us see her face. Interrupt her personal celebration.

The image of the young Black boy, no older than 8 or 9, who knew what Obama's election meant, in terms of the history of America, even though he couldn't fully grasp it. Though he stood up when the teacher asked him to explain about Obama's election, he was overcome and sat down.

The image of Donna Brazile being overcome with emotion as she explained how the thought of January 20, 2009, when Barack Obama comes down the steps of the U.S. Capitol to take the oath - the steps built by slaves - how they could have not ever imagined that someone of African descent would be coming down those steps to become President of the United States.

The image of the crowd in front of the White House celebrating Obama's victory, broke out and sang The National Anthem.

The image of the man riding around on his bike, with an American flag attached to him like a cape.

All of these ' Un-Americans' in the ' Anti-America' parts of this country.

After the nightmare of the last eight years wondering where the hell was the country I believed in, I found it again. In worse shape, battered, tattered, torn, but it's still there. I honestly didn't know if it was there. They had done such a number on me, I was beginning to wonder if it had ever been there.

After 40 years of race being used as a political tool, it was broken. The enormity of that is what has stunned me.

I said at the beginning of this that I wanted the answer to this question:

Would White people ACTUALLY vote for a Black man for President?

I said I didn't know the answer to the question, but I just wanted to know the answer. That this country was facing a moment of truth about itself. It was fast approaching the instance where the mythology of America was going to meet reality, and it was going to have to decide.

And, it did.

Georgia Back In Play?

Apparently the early voting in some areas was not taken into account.

The plot thickens.

If Obama can pull that off....

Meanwhile, in Missouri...the difference ended up being around 5,000 votes.

I wonder how Obama would have done if Missouri allowed early voting. Over the last few days... the Republicans began running those nasty ads... that could have scared a few folks.

Update:

After a closer look... McCain has such a huge lead in Georgia that the early voting won't likely change the outcome.... Obama would have to win the outstanding votes by more than 2 to 1. Highly unlikely.

Being An American- This Election

Something just came to me:

I feel as if this country just saved itself.

I try and be logical most times, but underneath it all, this experiment called America, is sometimes beautiful to behold. There have been some dark times, but when this country gets it right, it usually gets it right in such a bold way, it's stunning.

And, that's how Barack Obama won. By appealing to that boldness that each of us feels is there about this country. Being an American isn't about just understanding the positives, it's understanding the flaws. It's how I, a descendent of slaves, who were originally counted as 3/5ths a human being, can believe that the Constitution is the most profound document written in the past 400 years.

A poster said something during the primary season that I never forgot: she said watching Obama win like this made her feel like an American. Not a Black -American or an African-American, but an American. And, I knew what she meant, because it's how I've felt too. I would watch Obama rallies and SEE the America that I wanted to live in, and I was willing to work for that.

I finally see some light. I found my faith again. The faith in my country.

To quote our future First Lady:

For the first time in my adult life, I am REALLY proud of my country.

YES.WE.DID.

Election Night Open Thread

The Republican Political Death Watch - Election Night Open Thread

(Please Keep This Open Thread At the Top - No new posting at this time)

We will just update this post throughout the night. If you want to post or participate.... use the comments section.

Early exit poll numbers from the HuffPost


Obama/McCain

Florida: 52 percent to 44 percent
Iowa: 52 percent to 48 percent
Missouri: 52 percent to 48 percent
North Carolina: 52 percent to 48 percent
New Hampshire: 57 percent to 43 percent
Nevada: 55 percent to 45 percent
Pennsylvania: 57 percent to 42 percent
Ohio: 54 percent to 45 percent
Wisconsin: 58 percent to 42 percent
Indiana: 52 percent to 48 percent
New Mexico: 56 percent to 43 percent
Minnesota: 60 percent to 39 percent
Michigan: 60 percent to 39 percent

This is it.

I'll be coming back, to post updates.

So far, it's Indiana and Kentucky that are coming in.

Vermont for Obama

Kentucky for McCain

Indiana - a state that hasn't voted for a Democrat since Lyndon Johnson in 1964 - IS TOO CLOSE TO CALL

From fivethirtyeight.com about Indiana:

Indiana...
Just looking at some of the places where we have results in so far. Obama is substantially outperforming Kerry -- which is what he needs to do to win the state, of course, but the differences are pretty substantial.

Steuben: Kerry 34%, Obama 42%
DeKalb: Kerry 31%, Obama 38%
Knox: Kerry 36%, Obama 54%
Marshall: Kerry 31%, Obama 50%

Late deciders broke to Obama in North Carolina.



South Carolina and West Virginia for McCain.

___________

MSNBC Calls Pennsylvania for Obama. First Big State of the Night... a State that The Republicans said they HAD TO WIN!!!

MISSOURI- TOO CLOSE TOO CALL

___________

Yeah.... Missouri will be late as I expected. This is actually good news for Obama... rural areas come in first.... That means he's holding his own. He only has to stay close.... until the end. My two hometowns will take care of the rest if he's close enough :).


I'm multi-tasking... trying to ride the Dailykos Mothership.... and listen to the TV in the other room. I'm about to break out the radio next.

You can also follow with the Dkos Map.

--A.I.

Obama Doing Much Better Among N. Carolina Whites Than Kerry
by Jed L
Tue Nov 04, 2008 at 05:14:33 PM PST
In 2004, John Kerry won 27% of white voters in North Carolina.

In 2008, Barack Obama is winning 37%.

___________

New Hampshire goes for Obama according to CNN. A State where McCain wasted a lot of time a resources over the last couple of weeks, hoping for an upset. :)

--A.I.

McCain won Alabama

They just announced Georgia for McCain

_______________

CBS radio reporting Elizabeth Dole has fallen. :) And there will be no getting up.

Also... Keep Track of Missouri from KMOX Radio...listen to the online stream.

Another great station is KWMU...the NPR affiliate, which also offers an online stream.

--A.I.
_______________

Popular Republican Senator Sununu has fallen to opponent Jeanne Shaheen.

In the Missouri Governors Race... exit polls suggest that Atty Gen. Jay Nixon has absolutely crushed his opponent Kenny Hulshof. No final numbers yet.

Arkansas and Georgia - McCain

From MarcAmbinder:
04 Nov 2008 09:04 pm
Watching Virginia...
Obama's good well in the historic Hampton Roads region...good in the Richmond suburbs...he's outperforming John Kerry.... winning or tied (depending on the vote count) in Henrico County, which President Bush won by 8 points and Chesterfield Co., which Bush won by 26 points.

___________________

I was thinking that the pollsters screwed up on their sampling in Virginia. Hopefully he can catch up...

North Carolina and Florida are looking more promising.

Fox calls Ohio for Obama.... then changed their minds??? Interesting. :) Looks like they are panicking about Ohio.... and I hear they are sweating about Florida too.

--A.I.

OHIO OHIO OHIO - MSNBC!

NEW MEXICO - OBAMA

Keith O just broke it down: Obama's at 200 right now. Look at the map, people. Look at the Map.....

It's 9:47 EST and INDIANA STILL HASN'T BEEN CALLED.

from the polling, Obama's up 60-40 in MIAMI-DADE COUNTY so far

______________

See the official Missouri Results Here. You have a choice of text results or a map... refreshes every 2 minutes. Get to the Presidential race by using the tabs at the top of the Sec. of State Page.

______________

Obama comes from behind and takes the lead in Virginia????!!!

--A.I.
_______________


Obama not looking good in Missouri in early returns....but that's not too unusual.

Only rural counties coming in.

--A.I.

______________

538 reports that Republican Senator Chris Shays has fallen. This was a really big fish for Democrats.

I couldn't stand Shays.... he was arrogant as can be. Remember how he treated Katrina victims?

--A.I.

207 to 135 so far.

Obama is 63 away.

________________

McCain looking good in Missouri, unfortunately:

With about 20% of precincts reporting

John McCain, Sarah Palin REP 370,511 56.1%
Barack Obama, Joe Biden DEM 280,394 42.4%


--A.I.

_________________

The Missouri race

With about 34% of precincts reporting... McCain's lead is shrinking into dangerous territory.

John McCain, Sarah Palin REP 516,339 53.3%
Barack Obama, Joe Biden DEM 437,543 45.2%


--A.I.

Tweety - 'it's truly wondrous'.

FOX calls Virginia for Obama?

MSNBC CALLS IT

___________________

Ladies and Gentleman... we are witnessing a landslide in progress.

Virginia going towards Obama late...

Obama has now turned the tide in Missouri as I predicted.... not sure if it will hold...

But he closed the gap quickly. McCain/Obama are now running neck and neck in Missouri.

Numbers in a minute.


P.S. Governor-elect Jay Nixon is giving his acceptance speech...

--A.I.


Nevada - to Obama.

Florida - to Obama

Virginia - to Obama

Colorado to Obama

Obama is up to 338

Eugene Robinson is kicking ass.

The Possible ' Huxtable Effect' for Barack Obama

Hat tip: JJP

From Alternet

'The Huxtable Effect' and Obama

Posted by Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, Brave New Films at 1:22 PM on November 2, 2008.



With all the talk of the supposed 'Bradley Effect,' the media have missed the bigger story.


I voted early at the University of New Mexico today. As I stood in line (for 35 minutes) I tried to read a book and tried not to listen to other people's conversations. I managed the first okay, but the second? Failed.

Sometimes eavesdropping has its reward. A couple of twenty-something college students, neither one African-American, stood in front of me chatting about how they both used to wish Cliff Huxtable was their dad when they were kids. Cliff was tough, but cool. He wore ugly sweaters -- a plus ever since Mr. Rogers made it fatherly chic.

In all the talk about the supposed "Bradley effect" in this year's presidential election, I think big media have missed the much bigger story, which is to say few of them are writing/broadcasting about "The Huxtable Effect."



"The Huxtable Effect," as I've coined it, speaks to the importance of images in popular culture -- TV, movies, music, books, etc. -- and formation of both a sense of self in viewers and, most importantly for our discussion now, a sense of others.

Social scientists have long shown the link between what children see in popular media and how they view the society those images purport to represent. (A good source list here.)

In fact, it has been theorized that every major political movement in the United States has followed, by about two decades, a matching movement in the arts and pop culture.

The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s onward was predated by the Harlem Renaissance in literature and art, and the hyper-intellectual bebop movement in jazz, by about 20 years.

The women's rights movement that peaked in the 1960s and 1970s followed by about 30 years the Rosie the Riveter movement in American popular culture, which aimed to show strong women in movies and in music, spurring 6 million women to replace men at war in factory jobs.

There are no accidents of public consciousness, and there is no better tool for changing perceptions of social roles than popular culture.

So it is, I believe, that Barack Obama's successful candidacy and likely presidency were heralded with the arrival of The Cosby Show in 1984. On the air for eight seasons, The Cosby Show featured Bill Cosby as Cliff Huxtable, an all-American father, medical doctor, and love husband, in the lead role. Never before in American TV had there been such a character. But the impact of Cosby's weekly presence in America's family rooms, as the fair-minded, fun, quirky Dr. Huxtable, cannot be underestimated in its affect upon the consciousness of Americans who were children and young adults at the time.

Cosby was not alone in what I have come to think of as the Bel Air Renaissance for African-Americans in popular culture, begun in the mid-1980s. Oprah Winfrey's show got its start in 1986, and is still on the air. The 1980s saw: the rise of Denzel Washington and Wesley Snipes as America's favorite leading men, in mainstream, good-guy roles. It marked the mainstream entry of rap and hip-hop into the musical lexicon, and we saw Whitney Houston become the all-American girl-next-door vocalist (well, at least until she married Bobby.)

The incredible explosion of positive African-American role models in American popular culture, which started in the mid-1980s and has continued in force to the present day, has been profound and unprecedented in our history.

Barack Obama is reaping the political benefits of that now.

Unfortunately, the mainstream US media rarely connect political coverage to coverage of arts and culture. In newspapers, they are given separate sections, with politics regarded as masculine and important, and culture relegated to the "women's" pages. This disconnect is unfortunate, and has led to coverage of Obama's rise that is, in cultural context, laughably "surprised" by his ascent. For those of us paying attention to shifts in popular culture and public consciousness, Obama came as no surprise; he was as predictable as a happy ending to a Cosby Show rerun.

Part of the reason so many stories in the mainstream media have expressed astonishment at the rise of "a black man" to presidential candidate (and likely president) have to do with the simple fact that many of the older people in charge of those institutions owe their own worldviews to 1950s entertainment; to them, it is Ward Cleaver, not Cliff Huxtable, whom all kids wished were their own dad. America's editors and producers are living in a Ward Cleaver reality, unaware of The Huxtable Effect, or its many tentacles.

That having been said, it is important to note that the subsequent stories -- about the supposed "end of race" in America that today's mainstream editors believe Obama's candidacy represents -- are also incorrect.

Obama's success reflects the glass ceiling in American popular culture having been broken down by a single group among its many oppressed minority groups: African-Americans.

Latinos have had no such breakthrough.

In fact, according to some analysis, portrayals of Hispanics/Latinos in American popular culture are worse now than ever before. A UCLA study found that even though we represent 15 percent of the nation's population, we get less than 4 percent of all movie or TV roles; most of these are negative roles, such as gang member, criminal, maid or slut.

We have yet to see our own Huxtable family on TV. Yes, we had George Lopez, but between the drunk, abusive granny and the low-paying job, his TV family was hardly the astute, successful, happy, upper-middle class bunch we all might wish to belong to. Not since Desi Arnaz graced the small screen alongside wife Lucille Ball have we seen a middle-class Latino father who wasn't screwed up, and even so, Desi's character was cartoonish.

To make matters worse for Latinos, the drumbeat of hatred and fear-mongering on the immigration issue, on cable news programs -- especially Lou Dobbs -- and talk radio and in newspapers and magazines, has further sullied the image of all Latinos (most of whom are not immigrants, legal or otherwise, but this distinction is rarely made in US popular culture).

While hate crimes overall are down for all other groups, Latinos have seen hate crimes against us in the US increase dramatically during the past 8 years -- just as positive popular culture images of ourselves have declined, and hateful immigrant-bashing has increased. While the media jumped to protest cries of "kill him" about Obama by racists at republican rallies, the very same outlets had no problem promoting Dobbs and his ilk.

Yes, Obama is the political expression of a racial barrier knocked down in America, a movement begun in the arts and pop culture. But it does not mean the end of "race" or "ethnic" discrimination in our country. In many ways, it marks merely a beginning. I, for one, am hard at work writing TV pilots and movie scripts that I hope will start the New Uptown Renaissance -- for Hispanics/Latinos. If I succeed within the next few years, I can guarantee you that round about 2030, we will see the first viable Latino presidential candidate, and, hopefully, the first Latino/a US president.

AlterNet is a nonprofit organization and does not make political endorsements. The opinions expressed by its writers are their own.

0 Days And Counting: THE DAY IS HERE - The 14 Speeches of the Obama Campaign: Finally, The DNC Convention Speech

The Obama Introductory Film

August 28, 2008: Denver, Colorado - Barack Obama's Speech at Invesco Field

Links For Following the Election

Although the national numbers don't mean much at this point, I wanted to throw in the final pollster chart with the average of national polls.

You can follow the election in real-time here with an interactive map.

I will be splitting my time between CNN/MSNBC, Dailykos, and updating the blog.

Senate and House of Representative races are harder to track...but there are a few key Senate and House races that I will post on... especially Elizabeth Dole in the Senate. There are several Republicans who I would like to see go. Virgil Goode is another. I will definitely try to keep up with the Goode vs. Perriello race.

The only Governors race that I really have an interest in is for Missouri. The results for that race should come quickly....the Democrat, Jay Nixon, is way ahead. That will represent another Democratic pickup.

1 Day And Counting - The 14 Speeches of the Obama Campaign: #1, Michelle Obama at the DNC

August 25, 2008: Denver, Colorado - Michelle Obama at the DNC Convention

Michelle's Introductory Film





Michelle Obama's Speech to the Nation

Some Inspiration

Hat tip: Oliver Willis

2 Days And Counting - The 14 Speeches of the Obama Campaign: #2, Obama in Berlin

July 2008: Berlin, Germany -Before a crowd of 200,000 people,
Barack Obama takes the world stage.

This is a picture from a DailyKos diary during Obama's trip abroad. A parent was cooking dinner, when he heard silence from the other room with his children.
When he went to investigate, this is what he found:



The older child was instructing the younger one to
' be quiet because Obama was about to speak'.

More Inspiration From The Field

I know that sometimes it seems, I' m just one person. What can I do?

I know we're nervous about this election.

I found inspiration from this post over at The Field

Read the personal accounts from all over the country. Some in red states. Some in blue. Some in tossups. All important, IMO

It's Your Story Now
Posted by Al Giordano - November 1, 2008 at 6:27 pm

During these next 72 hours, some of us - for example, the presidential candidates and the reporters that track them - fade into a kind of irrelevance.

The candidates will be speaking, the journalists will be scribbling it, the pundits will be commenting upon it, but it begins to sound like a monotonous noise in the background of a much more compelling song being sung.

We now take a back seat to the authentic protagonists of this campaign: those of you on the ground that are knocking on doors, making phone calls, hauling voters to the polls and otherwise getting out the vote.

It's so intense on the ground, that a scribbler with a pad, or even a photographer, can tend to be underfoot: nobody in his and her right mind is paying us any mind at this hour anyway, unless we have yet to cast a ballot (your correspondent has already done that, and doesn't need a ride to the polls, thank you very much).

But the intensity of the ground game right now makes the reporting much harder to do...

Or does it?

I was just thinking to myself, hey, we have all these readers and commenters here that have been out all day doing that work. They're the eyewitnesses to history now!

Just then an email arrived from one of our regular commenters, in Illinois:

I have just returned from canvassing Indiana, after leaving Chicago at 7 am today. I would like to share with you what happened.

The campaign had previously e-mailed me and assigned me to a specific city (Indianapolis), a specific office in that city, and a specific staging area to meet in Chicago to get there. Normally in these staging areas there are more drivers than riders. This time so many volunteers showed up the cars filled up. I showed up 10 minutes late and was not able to secure a car. They had all filled up. The campaign then told me to go downtown to the Illinois HQ, which was a staging area for a different city in Indiana, Michigan City. While I'm in the HQ signing in and getting a ride, I see at least 75 people phonebanking.

We hit the road and ninety minutes later I'm in Michigan city. The field office there is packed: at least 100 volunteers are crammed into it. They have a three shift system: people canvass in the morning, and give their list to the second shift who knocks on the doors of anyone who wasn't home, and a third shift that knocks on any door that the second shift didn't make a contact with. I was assigned to the second shift, but there were so many volunteers I couldn't get a packet!

Michigan City, a fairly small city, had a satellite office. I was quickly sent there, to find a room with 4 campaign organizers and at least 50 volunteers. I managed to score the last walking packet for this office's second shift. I did my shift in a lower-income African American area and had a contact rate of 30% (mind you, using a walking sheet that had already been walked 2 hours ago; I was knocking on every door that had been marked previously as nobody home). Everyone I spoke with had either already voted or assured me they vote Tuesday for Obama.

The best part? On the way to the satellite office we passed the local RNC office. It was closed.

(I'll leave it up to the writer as to whether he wants to uncloak or not, here in the comments section.)

I'm betting more of you have stories like that.

Share them.

You must tell these stories.

Your story - of canvassing, of phone banking, of getting out and protecting the vote - is the single biggest news story of the hour.

Use the comments section here to tell those stories (or if you're shy, send me an email submission).

The microphone, the narrative, the blog - like the campaign itself - is now very much in your hands.

GO TO THIS POST AND READ THE REPLIES.

Read how individuals, just like you are working with others, to weave together something positive. To fight together for this country.

I dare you to read those replies and NOT be inspired.

YOUR help is needed

OK.

This is it.

The weekend where the rubber hits the road. I'm going to ask you to get them to come along with you and do whatever you do: phonebank, canvass, organize for GOTV. All hands on deck. We really need for everyone to do what they can. Go to BarackObama.com to see where you can help in your state. November 4th is Tuesday. This is the day where we can see the America we want to happen actually be realized. November 4th is that first crucial step.

3 Days And Counting - The 14 Speeches of the Obama Campaign: #3, End of Primary Season/Minneapolis Speech

June 3, 2008: Minneapolis, Minnesota - The End of the Democratic Primary Season

The Ground Game

One of the best websites of this political season has been FiveThirtyEight.com. I became addicted to it, when the owner, Nate Silver, would publish under the penname - Poblano. His accuracy in polling became almost legendary this political season.

One of the best series that they've had going has been " On the Road" series. Nate's fellow blogger has traveled the country, giving on the ground field reports on what they see at rival Obama and McCain offices. It has been illuminating.

Here is their latest entry, summing up their opinion of the Obama vs. McCain ground games.

The Big Empty

Friday, October 31, 2008
The Big Empty

As the only reporter during this election who has actually visited upwards of 50 of John McCain's field offices around the country (13 battleground states and counting), this piece by Matthew Mosk at the Washington Post comes as no surprise:

The decision to finance a final advertising push is forcing McCain to curtail spending on Election Day ground forces to help usher his supporters to the polls, according to Republican consultants familiar with McCain's strategy.

The vaunted, 72-hour plan that President Bush used to mobilize voters in 2000 and 2004 has been scaled back for McCain. He has spent half as much as Obama on staffing and has opened far fewer field offices. This week, a number of veteran GOP operatives who orchestrate door-to-door efforts to get voters to the polls were told they should not expect to receive plane tickets, rental cars or hotel rooms from the campaign.

"The desire for parity on television comes at the expense of investment in paid boots on the ground," said one top Republican strategist who has been privy to McCain's plans. "The folks who will oversee the volunteer operation have been told to get out into the field on their own nickel."

The busiest McCain office we saw was in Arlington, at the national HQ, but tight security prevented us from getting any pictures. Ironically, that was our first full office, in our 11th battleground state.

Offices in Troy, Ohio were closed on Saturday October 11. With perfect coincidental timing, two elderly women dropped by to volunteer but found the office shut. At Republican state headquarters in Columbus later the same day, one lonely dialer sat in a sea of unoccupied chairs. In Des Moines on September 25, another empty office. In Santa Fe on September 17, one dialer made calls while six chatted amongst themselves about how they didn't like Obama. In Raleigh this past Saturday, ten days before the election with early voting already open, two women dialed and a male staffer watched the Georgia-LSU game. In Durango, Colorado on September 20, the Republican office was locked and closed. Indiana didn't have McCain Victory offices when we were there in early October.

When the offices are open, they have reduced hours. We can confidently plan to get evening good-light photographs of a town after we visit the local McCain office, because we know it will be closing by 5 pm, as the office in Wilmington, North Carolina was this past Sunday. The plan is, get to inevitably closed/closing McCain office, get an hour of photos near sunset, then visit the bustling local Obama office.

In Cortez, CO, we had Republican volunteers pose for action-shot photos. The same in Española, New Mexico. Posed. For some time at the outset, we were willing to give Republicans the benefit of the doubt. They convinced us they were really working, and that we had just had unfortunate timing. It wasn't until the pattern of "just missed it" started to sound like a drumbeat in our ears that we began to grow skeptical. We never "just missed" any of the Obama volunteer work, because it goes on nonstop, every day, in every office, in every corner of America.

We found scattered nuggets of activity. Colorado Springs, Colorado held eight dialers and two front office volunteers. Albemarle County, Virginia had a busy office of 15 volunteers, and we reported that. Last night in Tampa, nine phonebankers were busy dialing at the Republican Party of Florida Hillsborough County HQ when we arrived at 8:00 pm. Seven dialers sat in McCain's Hickory, North Carolina office this past Saturday afternoon.

Those offices seemed busy to us, naturally, because they were explosively full relative to other offices we've stopped in on. But even the Colorado Springs office was dwarfed by the Obama Colorado Springs operation.

These ground campaigns do not bear any relationship to one another. One side has something in the neighborhood of five million volunteers all assigned to very clear and specific pieces of the operation, and the other seems to have something like a thousand volunteers scattered throughout the country. Jon Tester's 2006 Senate race in Montana had more volunteers -- by a mile -- than John McCain's 2006 presidential campaign.

When Republican volunteers talk to us about how much enthusiasm and participation they notice in fellow volunteers, they mention how many people have come to pick up yard signs or bumper stickers. We haven't yet seen a single Republican canvasser. (The one in Cortez, CO was staged; she said canvassing is the kind of thing she would do, and we made a decision to do the picture because we were concerned with not presenting "balance." There is no balance in the facts.)

When we attempted to visit the Republican HQ in Maryland Heights, Missouri, we saw a couple volunteers populating the office, and we were subsequently denied the opportunity to even speak to volunteers specifically selected so as to be "on message." By contrast, Obama's volunteers own such a piece of the campaign (Respect-Empower-Include) that the problem is they often have too much information, and when the campaign allows me to talk with them on the record I can ask a too-precise series of questions that result in publishing details the campaign later realizes it didn't want published.

We read the published comments from McCain spokespeople that argue the dialing/canvassing numbers are ahead of where they were at the same time four years ago. Well, either the Bush ground game of 2004 was the Big Myth, or those spokespeople are flat lying to reporters, who have no context to challenge those claims because they haven't seen the empty offices the way we have.

When the final chapters are written in this election about the ground game, many thousands of words will recognize that the Obama campaign truly was this:

But the other story, the story on which we've had a running eight-week exclusive in 36 separate On the Road pieces and counting, is that John McCain's ground campaign is just not happening. It hasn't been happening, without Sarah Palin there might be four or five volunteers across the entire nation left, and now, per Mosk's piece at WaPo, it looks like it will be happening even less.

--Sean Quinn

Please click on the piece and look at the pictures. Please read some of the series; it's been superb.

I'm not counting any chickens, I'm only stating my belief that the Obama Campaign has truly tried their best to win this thing; but, this is the time when they need US the most. WE are Get.Out.The.Vote.

4 Days And Counting - The 14 Speeches of the Obama Campaign: #4, Securing The Pledged Delegate Lead

May 20, 2008, Des Moines, Iowa-Securing the Pledged Delegate Lead