Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 13

Voter Suppression! (Fancy Campaign-Speak for "Stealing the Election")

So, yesterday, one of my vols (snazzy campaign-speak for "volunteers") went down to monitor the lines at our early voting location. People have been waiting up to three hours to vote, and we sent people down to encourage would-be voters to stay in line. We offered doughnuts, sandwiches, and personal audiences with Obama. What, did we go too far?

According to my vol, county election officials and poll workers told would-be voters waiting in the line that if they were not up to a certain point in the line by a certain time, they'd have to leave and come back another day to vote. This, even though by law, anybody in line by the time the polls close gets to vote.

Horseshit! (Groovy campaign-speak for "horseshit!")

Hasta la victoria, siempre! (Posh campaign-speak for "We're commies!")

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 12

Vote Early, Vote Often

In this battleground state, we've been able to vote early since the end of last month.

Today, I finally went to cast my vote. The cockles of my heart were warmed by the line. A two-hour wait. Democrats, waiting for two hours to vote early for That One.

We're gonna win this!

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 11

Consensus Trance

Here in this battleground state, our get-out-the-vote efforts begin officially on the 29th. We'll be contacting everyone who has self-identified as an Obama supporter and all the SuperDems that we didn't bother contacting during the campaign because they are, well, super. Every election they fly up to the polls, their blue capes just a-waving in the cool November wind. They cast their ballot for the Democratic Candidate, super-ly, and then fly off to their jobs at not-for-profits and American Apparel.

Thirty percent from these two groups of people will have already voted by Election Day, so we won't be contacting those people. Instead we'll be doing what the Republicans have historically done in this state so very well - we'll harass people into voting.

Up until this point, we've been contacting known regular/base and sporadic democrats as well as "persuadable" voters. Known/base dems are people who always vote democratic, but only in the "big" elections. Sporadics are people who vote, you betchya, sporadically. A persuadable voter is a person who has 1) recently registered, 2) voted both D and R recently, 3) not voted recently. 4) always voted R, but recently purchased How Would a Patriot Act? on Amazon.com.

Now, maybe it's just me, but I find it pretty fucking disturbing that the campaigns of the two presidential nominees have access to what books I've been purchasing on Amazon.com. I know it's just marketing as usual, but does this bother anybody else?

Everyone I've encountered on the campaign trail gets all Tom-Cruise-talking-about-Katie-Holmes about it, calling it wonderful, amazing, sensational. Sure, we're the good guy, and sure, we're using this information to get people to vote for the right candidate, but does this mean that the $20 I gave Obama went to purchasing my consumer history?

Hell, I would have told him for free.

The other day I read a bit about Consensus Trance. Charley Tart is a professor who writes on the subject. He says, "Together, human groups agree on which of their perceptions should be admitted to awareness (hence, consensus), then they train each other to see the world in that way and only in that way (hence, trance)."

Sounds like politicking at it's finest to me.

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 10

There is No Justice

So, Obama was visiting this battleground last week. It was all very exciting - huge crowd of people, completely forgetting everything Obama stands for and selfishly looking out for their own best interests and not those of the crowd.

Capitalists.

I had the very pleasant job of working the line. This involves a few tasks:

1. Checking people for homemade signs. The conversation goes something like this:

Me: No signs allowed, folks! If you brought a sign and you don't give it up now, the Secret Service will take it from you.

Mama for Obama: But look at this beautiful sign my daughter made. She worked so hard on it. Please?

Me: Sorry ma'am, I don't make the rules. No signs allowed.

Mama for Obama (to daughter): Sorry sweetie. This mean baldy says you can't bring in your beautiful sign. I guess Obama doesn't like art. Or children.

2. Making sure people fill out their tickets fully with name, address, phone, email, bank routing numbers, and mother's maiden name. The conversation goes something like this:

Me: Tickets? Can I see your tickets? They must be filled out for you to get in.

Suspicious ticket holder: Why do I need to fill this out? I RSVP'd online with all this info.

Me: Well, we need to confirm that you showed up.

Suspicious ticket holder: You already have all my information. Can I just put in my name?

Me: Not if you want to get in. I'll need all of your information.

Suspicious ticket holder: The paper said that the rally was free and open to the public. I don't even understand why you handed out these tickets. And now you need all my personal info again? I don't understand.

Me: Well, I don't make the rules. Please fill out your ticket.

(The reason is, of course, so we can hit them up to volunteer.)

3. Hitting up people to volunteer, straight-forward like. The conversation goes something like this:

Me: Only three weeks left to make a difference! Who is going to volunteer? I need people making calls and knocking on doors! Senator Obama is going to ask you to volunteer today. Who is going to sign up?

Rally attendee suddenly very interested in the view opposite from where I'm standing (thinking): Maybe if I look this way, baldy will go away.

Me: Sir, when can you volunteer for the campaign? Only three weeks left! We need your help.

Rally attendee "startled" from their reverie of the view opposite from where I'm standing: Oh! I didn't see you there! What now? Volunteer? I don't have time for that. Too busy. Way too busy. No free time. Not even one spare hour.

Me: Really? Because you seem to have 8 hours on a weekday to stand in line and wait to see the guy. I just need one hour a week for the next three weeks. And you won't have to be in a line full of cranky people on a hot day with anti-choice yahoos screaming at you from their dead baby truck.

4. Telling people to ignore the dead baby truck, and the crazed McCain supporter who has painted his truck with the names of the republican ticket, and the evangelists walking up and down the line asking why you hate God. This conversation goes like so:

Me: Folks, please ignore the dead baby truck. We're not here to engage in an argument with these people, which is what they want. Please ignore them.

Angry Obama supporter: But what they're saying isn't even true!

Me: I know, but a response from us validates them and we do not want to validate them, do we?

Angry Obama supporter: What does validate mean?

And so it went for hours. On my feet. In the heat. No water. No appreciation.

When the rally finally begins, I am sadly not inside. No, it seems I'm going to be stuck outside, hoping to catch a few words that will carry over the crowd.

This does not happen. I hear bits and pieces of Obama's speech - something about pie? - and then it's over. The same crowd that nearly ran me over to get in is now nearly running me over to get out.

*Sigh.* So much work and I don't even get to see Obama.

I'd invited someone to the rally who was visiting from out of town and who has not volunteered for the campaign at all. This person met up with me as the crowd dispersed. We'd been separated earlier in the day when volunteer tasks were being assigned.

He walks up and I get ready to hear his tales of rally-as-a-volunteer life. Instead, he says it was the most amazing experience of his life. He was placed on stage, and yes, shook the Senator's hand, as well as the hands of our governor and mayor. He doesn't even live in the state. Or in a battleground.

There is no justice.

I blame Bush. And McCain.

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 9

Dream Analysis in a Battleground

Lest anyone should wonder if election anxiety is creeping its way into my dreams, here is as accurate an account as I can give of my dream last night:

The volunteer coordinator of the campaign office kept stealing my writing utensils and replacing them with cookware - spatulas, tongs, soup ladles, etc. After I had stolen my pens and pencils back from her multiple times, and very cleverly put them in a container for kitchen utensils, thinking this would trick her, she did it again. When I went to confront her, she informed me that Senator Obama was coming to town and that it was my job to take him around and introduce him to all the volunteers.

Imagine my surprise when, upon his arrival at the office, in walked Mayor Tommy Carcetti, from The Wire. He wasn't with Barack, he WAS Barack. I was confused, but everyone was acting like he was Barack, so I went along with it. That is, until I took him to the first volunteer house. My volunteer opened the door, he said, "Surprise!" and hugged her, at which point she looked at me and said, "Who the hell is this guy?" I told her it was Barack Obama, but she wasn't buying it.

Barack Obama/Tommy Carcetti was very upset about her reaction. He'd been expecting a warmer reception. I hesitated for a moment and then said, "Well, Barack, you just don't look the way you look on TV. I mean, for one, you're black on TV. But here, you're white, and short, and you're also a character on an HBO drama. We're just confused."

He was hurt. He didn't understand. I asked him if he knew he was black, or at least that he appeared black on TV. He said he'd been hearing whispers. As best he could tell, there was a lighting issue the first time he ever appeared on TV, which made him look black. There was such a positive response to the possibility of the first black president, that his handlers had decided to keep using the lighting trick. Nobody had told him this directly - they didn't want him to be involved in the lie - but this was his theory as to what was happening. The constant rejection by people seeing him in person and realizing he was that white guy from The Wire, was really getting him down, though.

Sad, huh?

I wonder if Stringer Bell is white, too... And McNulty is black...

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 8

Highly Organized Suburban Women are Dangerous (or The Unfathomable Arrogance of the Obama Campaign)

So the Obama Campaign states that one of its goals is to create community organizations that will last beyond the campaign. The idea is to empower people in their communities and connect them with like-minded people who can work to make a difference in their neighborhoods, no matter the cause.

That's the official idea, and one that I am sure Senator Obama feels very strongly about. As with most ideas, however, the further away this one gets from its originator, the more the execution of this lovely idea goes haywire.

One of the paid campaign staffers said to me, while we were having a discussion about how best to use an existing community organization here in this battleground, that "highly organized suburban women are dangerous."

Dangerous? Like terrorists? I don't understand.

It was explained to me that since they were already organized, they didn't follow the direction of the 22-year-olds on how best to organize themselves.

Right, I said, they're already organized, you see. We don't have to come in and get them organized - they already are. All we have to do is give them tasks, and they will use their existing organization, intelligence, and hard work to git 'er done. They clearly don't need you to tell them how to do it.

Makes sense. Unless you're under 25 and paid by the Obama campaign, and this is your first job out of college, and you have no other job experience, not even from high school, and you seem to have fallen on your head and forgotten that your mother is or was, very likely, a highly organized suburban woman.

But they don't follow the rules, he says.

The rules. Hmmm. The rules of the campaign are to get organized and get Barack Obama elected. Both of these things seem to be important to this particular group of women. It was important to them during the Kerry campaign (for which they are all now snubbed by the Obama campaigners - even though most of the paid Obama staff wasn't old enough to vote in the last election) and they delivered this county to Kerry last election.

So, again I'll ask, what's the problem?

Well, the problem is that highly organized suburban women are dangerous. They have their own ideas about how this should be done, ideas that differ from our ideas.

And who are these women anyway? They're just accomplished career women, who have raised families, whose kids are all in college, who live in the most affluent part of town, who are well connected and pretty much successful in every area of their lives. They can't just decide how to organize themselves without consulting us, The Children's Crusade, first.

But you know they're already organized, right? You know they have done what Senator Obama did right out of college, which is form successful and lasting community organizations, with the best interests of their neighbors at heart?

And so it goes. Round and round. It's a bit like talking to a wall. A brick wall. With acne. Sometimes I just want to smash my head into that brick wall, but then I think about how gross and oily their foreheads are. So instead I just sigh and walk away.

Sigggggghhhhh .......arrgggghghhhhhhhh....siiiiiiiiggghhhh ...arrrggghhhh!

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 7

Barber Shops and Beauty Salons

In this battleground state, barber shops and beauty salons are considered official places for canvassing. On the ground we have faith coordinators, youth coordinators, and barber shops and beauty salons coordinators.

I found this to be hilarious, and asked (incredulously, I might add) if the whole barber shops and beauty salons thing wasn't a joke. My supervisor's response? You know Obama is black, right?

So then I suppose I should set up shop outside a Popeye's. Or maybe a reggae shop. Oh wait, perhaps a stand that sells watermelon and kool-aid?

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 6

The Children's Crusade

My field organizer got fired this week. He's 24. He got fired by the Regional Field Director who's 23. The RFD's boss is 21. And her boss is Abigail Breslin.

Okay, so that last part was a joke, but if you're wondering why the higher up in this campaign you get the younger you seem to be, you're asking a good question.

Not forgetting that Barack Obama is young and has less experience than a person who has been alive since, say, the Civil War, these young whipper-snappers at the top are proving to be a challenge.

Young people are an excellent resource for any campaign for a few reasons:

- They are brimming with optimism.
- They require little to no sleep.
- They have not yet learned the art of saying no for the purpose of self-preservation.
- They are usually not yet established and therefore highly mobile and adaptive.

All good things for a campaign.

Having children run the campaign also has its obvious downsides:

- These kids have no experience in the real world.
- They are brimming with optimism, which goes unchecked.
- They require little to no sleep, so they don't. No sleep equals fried brain.
- They don't know how to say no, so they end up with a workload far greater than what they can handle.
- And since their superiors are even younger and less experienced than they are, they get no help or direction on how to deal with the fact that they have no idea what the fuck they are doing.

Add on to this problem the fact that these are all hired campaigners from out-of-state. They storm into town, all fire and brimstone, but are so young and inexperienced that they don't understand that community building requires more than excitement. Plus, communities like ours don't warmly accept outsiders. Period.

Fuckhead Guiliani, fascist asshole, made a joke of Obama's experience as a community organizer last night at the convention. That Sarah Palin had one of her own, one she's continuing to repeat on the campaign trail.

For now, I'll ignore how foolish it is to make an amusing pastime out of mocking community organizing in the face of lost jobs and abject poverty. Instead, I can't help but think how truly remarkable Barack Obama is. I'm here watching well-intentioned, sincere, and enthusiastic young people flounder on the battleground, trying to do the same thing. I'm also watching them be led by not-so-well intentioned, self-seeking, egotistical young people who are merely looking for a notch on the belt.

From my own experience, which is informed by what I've seen and heard here on the battleground, community building requires a delicate mix of confidence, humility, compassion, empathy, organization, and charm, among other things. The fact that Barack Obama managed to exhibit all of those things at such a young age and with such success is amazing.

It's unfortunate that hundreds of little Baracks aren't running his campaign.

Maybe this is why the right-wingers fear that stem-cell research will lead to cloning. We could totally use a little ObamArmy.

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 5

You're Doing a Heckuva Job, Johnny

McCain's choice of running mate has caused a bit of elation here in the battleground, among us Obamaniacs.

As I've mentioned, we have a lot of disenfranchised Hillary supporters in this area, and gosh darn if they are gonna let John McCain get away with putting another pair of breasts and ovaries to substitute for Hillary's. These ladies are not so easily placated, you foolish, foolish man.

He's also managed to irritate the hell out of all the soccer moms who think that a woman with a 4-month old baby with special needs and 4 other children at home should be at home, being the hockey mom she claims to be.

It's really perfect. We don't have to say anything. Women are either offended by him or by her.

Thanks McCain! You're a blessing from Chicago!

LATE UPDATE: Oh, and the soccer moms are none too impressed with her 17-year-old pregnant daughter either. Why didn't he just choose Jamie-Lynn Spears' mom as a running mate?

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 2

NOTE: Names (even in rhyme) have been changed to protect the innocent and the not-so-innocent.

Project Rhymes-With-Cake-in-Spain

So, my first official act as an Obama campaigner in this battleground state was to participate in Project Rhymes-With-Cake-in-Spain.

I arrived, as instructed, late at night at the campaign office downtown. Incidentally, the Obama campaign office is directly across the street from the Republican state headquarters. The Obama office is a rusted out old storefront with a broken front door, while the Republican office is a miniature white house, complete with lush green lawn and shutters. Seriously.

One of the regional directors, Rhymes-With-Blenny, gave us our instructions for the evening. This particular regional director is about four-and-a-half feet tall and weighs as much as that weird lump on the side of McCain's face. And she says everything interrogatively? And hal-ting-ly.

"So what we're gonna do??? Is go out there and post O-bam-a stuff??? All over this town??? And this is really a-ma-zing??? It's a gift from Chi-ca-go???"

She said this last thing like it was a gift from God, although as it was said questioningly, like it was from God, but she wasn't sure.

And her voice. Oh, her voice. It's impossibly nasally. Like not human. She's congested with awe and optimism and youth.

I sat and listened and wondered if the fate of our fine nation is truly lying in the hands of Rhymes-With-Blenny, and others like her. After participating in Project Rhymes-With-Cake In Spain, and finding out that Rhymes-With-Blenny is the lady-friend of a certain higher up in the campaign (no, not Rhymes-With-Floflama; what, do you think we're the Rhymes-With-Sledgewards campaign?) and meeting many of the fine young soldiers here on the ground, I have one major question...

Do we have a chance in Rhymes-With-Fell?

Guest Post - Baldy in a Battleground - Episode 1

Moral Authority Matters, But Not as Much as Yard Signs

Last week Howard Dean came to town and spoke during a voter registration drive at a local college. His message was that moral authority matters, and the US needs Obama so that he can use his mad diplomatic skillz to help regain our moral authority around the world. Healthcare? Sure. And end to this unlawful war? OK. Economic relief? We'll take it. But, most importantly, we need to show the rest of the world who's boss.

Wait, what?

Last week I also learned the biggest challenge facing the soldiers in this battlefield for Obama is a lack of yard signs. We don't have any yard signs. McCain yard signs are abundant. Even Hillary yard signs are abundant. But no Obama yard signs.

When I inquired as to the reason for the lack of yard signs, I was met with angry stares by all of the higher-ups in the campaign. It's a hot button issue here on the ground, where residents of this state are uncomfortable putting a bumper sticker on their car, or wearing an Obama t-shirt, or attaching a pin to their bag, yet they will put a yard sign in their front lawn. It's not clear why Chicago has decided on no yard signs in this battleground state, but I'm told we might have them after the convention.

I'm going to keep praying to my Obama poster every night that we get the goddamn yard signs.

Baldy in a Battleground

Hello, readers. I'm thrilled to announce a new semi-regular feature on B&E. I've got a bald friend in a battleground state who's volunteering for Barack Obama. And "Baldy" (who for the purposes of this report wishes to remain anonymous) has graciously agreed to send in reports from the field. The inaugural report will be posted this evening. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.