Instead of sitting in front of the computer and continually hitting "refresh" to watch the OH-2 results come in, we went out and walked our precinct.
Some background: we live in a district where the R's win by 30-point margins. There is a two to one R:D registration ratio. The party here is in shambles.
We got sucked in gradually. First, we were involved in the Dean campaign. When that imploded, we moved on to Kerry. When Governor Dean became Party chair, we followed the DFA directive to get involved at the local level. We became precinct volunteers. It's been a struggle. We've received training from DFA, but precious little from the local apparatus.
At the end of June, we received new precinct lists with vague instructions to update them and have them ready by the next local Democratic club meeting (no date given). So, we went out and purchased a cheap pay-as-you-go cell phone, set up a Yahoo e-mail account, printed out business cards on our inkjet printer, assembled some materials (introduction letter, a download from the state party website about the upcoming special election (this is CA), and permanent absentee voter applications). We broke down the list street-by-street. Last night, as the results were trickling in, we ventured forth and covered two streets near our house.
People were happy to see us.
One gentleman stood outside his house as his dinner grew cold to discuss local politics with us. He thanked us repeatedly for getting involved and cards were exchanged with promises of future collaboration. At another house we spoke with a woman whose son just became a citizen. We promised to return with a voter registration form. Around ten minutes after we left that house, her husband came running down the street, asking if we were Democrats. When he caught up with us, he thanked us for visiting his house and wanted to know how more Latinos could get involved in government. We invited him to tonight's DFA meeting and he said he would be there.
So, no one set his or her dogs upon us, people were uniformly polite and generally happy to see us. On the other hand, we probably live in a reasonably "easy" precinct. We are immediately adjacent to a university and precinct turnout in the general election was over 89%.
However, and here is the point that we should note: there is no ground game here. There are Democrats, but they feel isolated and out-of-touch with respect to the party. We were able to cure two streets' worth of that last night with a pleasant stroll around the block.
Only fourteen more to go.