what a difference 400+ miles makes. in wisconsin, the thing that was obvious to all who walked into the office was swag (buttons, bumper stickers, etc) had to be purchased. but wisconsin was obama's. ohio is different. buttons, especially, are being handed out like candy, for free.
the trip here was like every other time i've been to/through ohio this decade -- the weather sucked. lake effect snow in the beginning. salt/plow trucks everywhere. better to be done with it. unfortunately, that same weather deterred some people from making the effort.
the main office in cleveland (which is not the state office, that's in columbus) could give you the impression that obama has moved his entire chicago office staff here. the national policy director is here. axelrod is said to be pacing close by. except half the people i know are in texas. split squads?
i'm working right outside of cleveland at the maple heights office. it's been open almost two weeks, and -- for the most part -- they've already completed their first round of voter id's. i'm a happy boy! i'm a big, huge believer in three rounds of door knocking, so it's good to know that they have basically done the first round.
i've arrived in ohio at a time when barack "is rapidly gaining ground" against hillary. (clinton leads obama among likely voters, 47% to 45%, making it a statistical tie, according to the rasmussen report. her lead is now just two points in ohio, down from five-points in the previous poll, an eight-point advantage last week and fourteen points two weeks ago.) it doesn't hurt that cbs' main political story was, Can Clinton's Campaign Be Saved In Ohio? it may not be ohio at gettysburg, but there is a certain feel about it. you'd think that would buoy expectations here, but no one here is paying attention to polls. it's all about field.
sound familiar? the national journal's sean miller calls it Surprisingly Organized -- hey, we're democrats, so people are surprised!
Lopsided voter turnout in the primaries -- most recently in Wisconsin where 1.1 million Democrats voted, compared with 410,000 Republicans -- is being dismissed by many observers as an "enthusiasm gap": Democrats are more excited about their unique candidates, and are further motivated to vote by their desire to recapture the Oval Office.
"Enthusiasm has something to do with it," said John Norris, who was the Kerry-Edwards campaign's national field director in 2004 and is now an adviser to Barack Obama's organization. "But some of it is definitely the result of the higher organizational level."
This primary cycle, the Democratic presidential candidates, particularly Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, have organized unprecedented grassroots campaigns -- hiring field organizers, opening local offices, and recruiting volunteers -- that dwarf those of their Republican rivals. In Iowa, for instance, Clinton had 400 field organizers on the ground before the caucus, whereas former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney had 17. In New Hampshire, John McCain had three field offices; Obama had 16. Even in California -- where campaigns are usually waged almost exclusively through television ads -- Obama and Clinton set up dozens of field offices and recruited hundreds of volunteers, while McCain and Romney relied on regional campaign representatives to organize events.
Karen Hicks, a senior adviser to the Clinton campaign, echoes Norris's assessment. "There's more organizing going on on the Democratic side than there has really been ever," she said. "Absolutely, I think it's had an impact on turnout."
The Democratic campaigns could be seen flexing their organizational muscle in Wisconsin, where severe weather made staging events difficult. Clinton had to cancel a rally in Madison the Sunday before the February 19 primary because of a snowstorm. But her campaign was able to reschedule the event for the next night and still get more than 3,000 people to show up, said Meagan Mahaffey, executive director of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. "That's got to be more than people being excited."
Some partisan observers have questioned whether Democrats can maintain the higher voter-turnout levels. Hicks is adamant: "It just seems asinine to me [to think] that people are going to turn out in a primary and sit out a general election."
Still, Democrats have reason to be cautious, said Paul Manuel, director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College. "The grassroots is functioning with the Obama campaign most notably because Obama represents a completely new candidate and everybody sees that," he said. "He's reaching a whole segment of the population that isn't committed, not particularly informed about policy, and not particularly involved.
"If he were not to win the nomination, that might suppress voter turnout," Manuel said. "You're left with the traditional Democratic coalition."
well, maybe. one of the points i wanted to make to bob's question (Did Dean's 50-State strategy yield Obama?) is that obama's effort is both complementary to what dean is doing and has done, but is also an outgrowth of it. some might remember the so-called "great dean nation" that sort of followed howard dean's campaign across the country. i likened it to a grateful dead tour (for us oldsters), which had a caravan of fans go from concert to concert, following the band. the media focused on the generation dean then, just as it focuses on the youth vote today with obama -- but that's because it's a prettier picture (it is! there's nobody rushing to take my picture and who can blame them?). but that frame missed a huge slice of dean's (and obama's) support: older americans who were basically disillusioned by american politics and needed a fresh face to activate them (again). these political newbies brought/bring as much if not more enthusiasm to these campaigns as the young people. regardless, we are building a democratic party transformed:
In the crucible of the searing competition between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, a new Democratic coalition is being forged.
Their gripping race for the party's presidential nomination has not only increased Democratic turnout around the country -- often to record levels -- it has also significantly changed the composition of that turnout, possibly tipping the party's internal balance of power.
From New Hampshire to California, and from Arizona to Wisconsin, exit polls from this year's contests show the Democratic coalition evolving in clear and consistent ways since the 2004 primaries that nominated John Kerry. The party is growing younger, more affluent, more liberal, and more heavily tilted toward women, Latinos, and African-Americans.
In the 18 states for which exit polls are available from both 2004 and 2008, the share of the Democratic vote cast by young people has risen, often by substantial margins. Voters earning at least $100,000 annually have also increased their representation in every state for which comparisons are available -- again, usually by big margins. Women's share of the vote has grown in 17 of the 18 states (although generally by smaller increments). In 12 of the states, Latinos have cast a larger percentage of votes, as have the voters who consider themselves liberals. African-Americans have boosted their share in 11 of the 18 states.
These dramatic changes, measured by the Edison/Mitofsky National Election Pool exit polls posted for both 2004 and 2008 by CNN, represent the convergence of long- and short-term trends. Each of the Democrats' growing constituencies has demonstrated a special affinity for one of the two finalists in the nomination race -- young people, the affluent, and African-Americans for Obama; and women and Latinos for Clinton. But some of these rising groups have trended Democratic for years, and the key constituencies all moved, often sharply, toward the Democrats in the 2006 elections that swept the party to control of Congress.
what is interesting -- and different -- here in ohio is that the obama campaign has basically stripped down efforts here to it primary parts. we aren't really running phone banks here in ohio, we are focused on canvassing. given the amazing phone banks that the obama campaign has set up elsewhere (including chicago!) as well as those by our union allies and the ability for supporters to call from home, this seems like a smart decision. so people who are in the state are encouraged to talk to their neighbors and knock on doors in their neighborhoods. those who have come from out of state -- including dale skaggs of illinois who joined us in milwaukee -- are being put to work knocking on doors. as miller noted, this represents a sea change in approach by democrats:
Until recently, Democrats had moved away from grassroots campaigning, instead relying on paid advertising for persuasion while counting on unions and activist groups to bolster voter turnout. "You tend to get away from putting people on the ground" when you rely on outside organizational support, said Norris, who is credited with building one of the more intensive Democratic grassroots efforts during the 2004 campaign. "There was a period there in the 1970s and '80s when you reduced your [field] operation to GOTV."
He added, "The paid [advertising] piece is obviously still a big part of it, but we've gone back to using the field operation and volunteers, and the technology has made it so much more effective."
if you've visited the obama website, you'll notice the "one million" theme. we are using that theme here in ohio -- we want to knock on one million doors before election day. now i don't know how much progress has been made, i may not ever know, but it's thematically joined with the accomplishments of the obama campaign to date. it reinforces that accomplishment and sets an ambitious goal for people to become a part of. talk about an inspiration driven message! that's our big push for today, to knock on as many doors as humanly possible -- many for the second time! -- here in ohio. from the main offices to the little satellite offices across the state, the obama campaign will be sending out thousands and thousands of people, quite a few from illinois, to knock on doors today. to great effect:
Hicks points to Iowa, Nevada, and New Hampshire -- purple states where the Democratic campaigns have organized most heavily. "We have created a base that the nominee is going to be able to go back and tap into," she said. "Those assets will still be there."
It takes months, even years, to build a grassroots effort, Manuel said. "The work they're doing now could produce results later. It's very useful. If they weren't doing the work now, two months before the general [election], there's no way they would be able to do it."
Still, he adds, the Republicans' organization shouldn't be written off. On the Democratic side, "the infrastructure isn't there," he said. "The Republicans are already in place, but they're silent right now."
[...]
In past GOP campaigns, said Davidson, who served in the Ohio House for two decades, "there wasn't as organized an effort. They thought they could do everything from television ads."
The campaign relied on coordinators of field efforts and phone banks to work with the volunteers, she said. "We had a very skinny payroll, 18 to 20 people." Davidson added: "This kind of a grassroots effort is absolutely necessary to have a victory" in 2008.
it's a formula that we should have never gotten away from. the party is stronger when people are empowered and feel responsible for it's future. campaigning at a distance -- well, on television -- may make media consultants happy, but it has always been able to be undermined by a strong field operation (ask david axelrod about his last mayoral race in detroit). my point to bob's question is that obama represents continuity with dean in so many ways. it's sort of a new and improved dean-plus campaign. it's no longer about anger, it's about more than ourselves, it's about more than millions of voices calling for change. it's about millions of americans making change, being the change. and that is transformational:
This real-time reconstruction of the Democratic coalition carries important implications for the nomination fight, the November election, and the future competition between the two parties.
Although both Obama and Clinton have benefited from aspects of the shift, on balance most analysts agree that the new patterns are helping Obama more. In most states, he has defeated Clinton among the affluent and routed her among the young, the two groups whose participation has increased the most. "If you look at the groups that are growing, I think it's safe to say that Barack Obama is both causing the majority of it and benefiting the most from it," one senior Obama strategist said.
The implications for the general election could be significant. If Democrats can maintain the allegiance of the constituencies now pouring into their primaries -- especially young people -- they could seize an edge in November's election, and potentially well beyond. "These are long-term opportunities that could change a generation of leadership in the country and give the Democrats a huge leg up on obtaining or achieving elective office," says Matthew Dowd, the chief strategist for President Bush's 2004 election campaign and now a consultant for ABC News. "But it all depends on how they conduct themselves."
[...]
Population changes explain only a small piece of these trends. Almost all of the groups that are rising in the Democratic primaries are also growing in the overall population, but not nearly as fast as inside the party's coalition. From 2004 to 2006 (the latest year for which Census Bureau figures are available), the share of the population ages 18 to 29 increased, but just from 16 percent to 17 percent; the share of Americans earning at least $100,000 rose from 15 percent to 18 percent. The female share of the population declined slightly.
Pulling the lens back to include the 2000 primaries in which Al Gore defeated Bill Bradley reinforces most of these trends. In all 14 states in which exit polls are available for both this year's Democratic contests and the 2000 primaries, the share of the vote cast by young voters and those earning at least $75,000 annually is higher now. In 10 states, liberals are now a larger proportion of the vote. For women, whose dominance in Democratic primaries is long established, the trend is mixed: Their share is higher this year in seven of the 14 states, and lower or unchanged in the rest. For African-Americans, dips in turnout slightly outnumber gains; Latinos have gained in all but one state, but mostly only modestly.
As these demographic groups rise in importance within the party, others, such as white men and seniors, are sinking. Total turnout for these groups is not necessarily falling. The overall surge in Democratic participation this year means that in many states, even groups whose relative role is declining are voting in larger absolute numbers: Their share of the vote is shrinking only because they are not growing as fast as other components of the party's coalition. (For instance, although white men's portion of the Democratic vote fell in Massachusetts this year, the total number of white men participating in the state's Democratic primary increased by nearly 75 percent over 2004, according to the exit polls.)
what we need to remember here is that barack obama is continuing to build upon the harold washington coalition of blacks, browns and white progressives:
Obama is succeeding where his wine track predecessors failed, largely because he has won overwhelming majorities of African-Americans, who in the past generally sided with beer track candidates. But his success is also tied to the party's changing composition. Two of Obama's most supportive groups -- the young and the affluent -- are expanding their influence in the party. Clinton's strongest support has come from seniors and noncollege white voters, two groups that are waning in significance.
These shifts could create long-term strains for the Democratic Party. In particular, Democratic candidates may face tensions in reconciling their growing reliance on upper-income voters with the party's increasing emphasis on an edgy populist message that portrays the economy as unfairly tilted toward the affluent.
In the near term, though, the new patterns present clear opportunities. These trends are especially encouraging for Democratic planners, and worrisome for Republicans, because they compound changes evident in the electorate since at least 2004.
[...]
One veteran GOP strategist said that if McCain is paired against Obama, which now seems most likely, the Republican will need to overcome a likely surge toward the Democrat among young people and independent affluent voters by making big inroads among downscale whites and seniors who are uncertain about Obama's national security experience.
Dowd says that even if McCain wins, Republicans should still worry about these trends, especially among young people. On issues from Iraq to social tolerance, Dowd notes, young voters have moved sharply toward the Democrats since Bush took office.
In 2000, under-30 voters split about evenly between Bush and Gore, according to exit polls. In 2004, they preferred Kerry over Bush by 54 percent to 45 percent. In the 2006 House elections, they backed Democrats by 60 percent to 38 percent. In a race between Obama, 46, and McCain, 71, even many Republicans wouldn't be surprised to see that wide a gap among the young.
"If you look at Ronald Reagan and how he performed among youth, he created a generation of Republicans that was able to sustain itself," Dowd says. "Well, what Bush has done in his presidency is almost the opposite: He has won elections and lost a generation. Now this generation is emerging, and if Democrats end up winning this election, and then govern in a way that gives people a sense that it is a new politics, they will have a generation. It will be the reverse of Reagan."
Such are some of the stakes in a riveting election that is already remaking the electoral landscape.
yes we can...