So dad, what did you do in the all-important 2008 election? Well kids, let me tell you about today's effort...
I went down to the Obama South Boulder office (Neptune Mountaineering in the Table Mesa Shopping Center) to volunteer from 9:00 - 10:45. They put me on phone calls.
The calls went really well - I've done a lot of telesales (enterprise software) and so this was pretty straightforward although it has differences from selling software. I was able to help the ones there who did not have any experience at it on how to ignore the 25% who were rude or mean or fed up with the calls. The trick is to think of one that went well when making each call - and you have to know that the next one will go great.
Got a pretty good response on this including one woman who lost her mail in ballot and so has to go vote on Tuesday, and 2 people who thought they could turn the ballot in at their polling place (why can't you?).
While I was working Mark Udall's wife came in to thank the volunteers individually. When I introduced myself she knew who I was - and was very very classy about it. She also said it was nice to see that some bloggers actually get out and work on the campaigns. I told her that most do - but everyone here, add a comment for what you did today to list it out.
At 10:45 I took off to go canvass for Joe Whitcomb. It's the closest legislative race and so I wanted to put in a day helping. To take the optimistic view in action as well as words.
We met at 11:30 in Broomfield to then be told to drive up to Fredricksburg to be there at 12:30. I wish campaigns would just give the final location/time as I could have called for another 45 minutes. But I know it works better to get people lined up this way.
So we get up there and they give me my list in Firestone (next to the towns of Goodyear, Pirelli, and Michelin). Joe was having us hit undecided female voters.
So I get out of my car and the first 3 yards have McCain signs and I'm thinking, ok this is going to be a rough day. The next house is my first stop and has no yard signs. Turns out the husband & wife there both voted the straight Democratic ticket.
To make a long story short, both the first and second lists they gave me were in neighborhoods that seemed pretty evenly matched. What was amazing was over half the yards had political signs. People are involved in this election. This is a place where you get a decent home cheap, the backyards all have trampolines and the garages all have motorbikes. And this election matters to the majority of people here - a lot. Our democracy is healthy.
So how's it look for Joe? Who? Joe, Joe Whitcomb - state Senate. What party is he? Democratic. Well I voted all Democratic/Republican for all those other races so I voted for him/his opponent. I met one person who remembered talking to him and one person who left that vote blank because they didn't know either candidate. And everyone else who had voted already voted the party.
But I think my talking and literature dropping helped because for those who have not voted, they actually have had a reach out from one of the candidates. That should help for a couple of votes.
There were 6 of us total, Joe, his campaign manager, and 4 volunteers. This strikes me as poor the weekend before the election but my measure is my mom who will have 20 out there if she has an opponent (half of them family). Are these good numbers or bad?
I didn't see anyone else out canvassing but I did see literature on an occasional door - either a Republican or Democratic party drop. The Republican ones were McCain/Palin only while the Democratic ones had a number of things in them from the look of the bag.
So done around 6:30 and I felt pretty good - we had all been out there, no sign of Shawn Mitchell. I saw 2 Shawn Mitchell signs (and no Joe Whitcomb ones) so looking solid. And as I drove out of Fredrick...
There at a major intersection was a boatload of Shawn Mitchell signs just put up and a bunch of clean-cut kids all wearing Mitchell shirts and waving. If they were out all day hitting doors then they had a bigger presence than Joe. If all they were doing was this one waving and this was all Shawn had, then Joe did better.
I then met Mrs. Blog for dinner (my youngest daughter has a busy social life so she took off with her friends). And then headed back to the Obama office to make more calls as they told me earlier they would be open till 9:00pm.
Got there at 8:00pm and it was closed. If they closed because people would be annoyed if called after 7:30 then it was a good decision. But if it makes sense to keep calling till 9:00 and they left cause they were tired - not good. We have 4 days left.
What was unquestionably bad was there was no sign on the door as to what time they open tomorrow morning. While I was there looking another person drove up and she wanted to know when to be there tomorrow morning. I'm guessing they will have 20 - 40 people stop by with that same question. Bad move not putting what/when for Sunday on the door.
But it is a solid operation. I'd say we had 8 of us calling and the canvassing group had another 8 running the office while there was a constant stream of volunteers coming in, given packets, and then heading out to walk the streets.
What did YOU do today?
