Tuesday, January 19, 2010
A test for Organizing for America
By any measure, the 2008 Obama campaign had an excellent ground game -- tens of thousands of volunteers who were passionate about their candidate, and worked constantly to distribute campaign material and increase turnout. I saw this phenomenon first hand, as the campaign canvassed my suburban Philadelphia neighborhood door-to-door. I did not witness any McCain volunteers knocking on doors in what had been a dependable Republican district twenty years ago.
Right after the election, I remember seeing a video clip making fun of die-hard Obama campaigners, done in a nice way, depicting them as zombies or robots with no mission, wandering around aimlessly with nothing to do, now that their candidate had won. In reality, many continued to work for Organizing for America.
OFA has been fully mobilized for the Massachusetts special election, which a visit to the website makes clear. Today's Philadelphia Inquirer reported:
As part of that effort, OFA officials said volunteers across the country, including in Pennsylvania, have made more than 500,000 calls to Massachusetts voters on behalf of the Democratic nominee in today's special U.S. Senate election, State Attorney General Martha Coakley. She is battling with Republican Scott Brown in a race that could determine the fate of the health-care legislation.A Brown victory later today has to give pause to OFA volunteers, wondering how a Democrat could cough up such a huge lead in such a deep blue state. It is not just President Obama who rolled the dice by going to Massachusetts this past weekend to campaign, but also OFA and its volunteers that will have its power tested today.
As a Philadelphia Eagles fan, I can relate. After watching the Eagles lose badly two weeks in a row at Dallas (the second game was a first round playoff game), and then watching Dallas lose badly at Minnesota this past weekend in a playoff game, I have to think that the 11-5 Eagles are not as good as I thought they were, and that we have some ground to make up on the elite teams in the NFC. It's an annoying realization as a fan, and it must really be a sinking feeling if you are a campaign volunteer who has lived and breathed Barack Obama's political aura for much of the past three years. In politics, as in sports, the seeds of failure are contained in the fruits of success, and vice versa.
Of course, a Coakley victory would reaffirm the supremacy and effectiveness of the OFA legions, but the close call won't feel very good.
6 Comments:
By 
, at
Tue Jan 19, 02:42:00 PM:
Since the stated Democratic plan is to pass their unworkable, big-government agenda whether we want it or not, I'd like it better if they would rename themselves "OAA" for Organizing Against America. It would be much more honest.
By 
J Haley, at
Tue Jan 19, 02:51:00 PM:
Regardless of today's outcome, the bloom is off the rose. Conservatives should be shocked that, after all the liberal rhetoric of such a strong voter mandate, the mandate is essentially over now. Liberals cannot ignore reality either. A slim win in the country's bluest state is no victory at all.
By , at
Tue Jan 19, 04:01:00 PM:
bankerinrealife:
You are wildly optimistic about the firmness of the Democrat's hold on reality.
These are the folks who hold Hitler to be a Conservative and who have successfully co-opted MLK even though he was a life long Republican. The Democrats survived the Civil War, for Pete's sake.
They went on to become the Party of "African America", as they say.
No, you can bet that if she wins by just one vote, they will take it as a vindication of their agenda. We will not hear the end of it. In fact, they will repeat it so constantly and soi loudly that no small portion of the electorate will actually start to believe it true.
No, in either case, they will not be daunted. This are hard core, doctrinaire Communist we are talking about.
The best we can hope for is that there are enough on the Hill to balk, and that Soros does not have enough money to give all of them plump sinecures somewhere or the other.
By Purple Avenger, at
Tue Jan 19, 04:13:00 PM:
Liberals cannot ignore reality either.
Yea they can. Its what they do best.
By JPMcT, at
Tue Jan 19, 09:55:00 PM:
Welcome to reality: Scott Brown has just won, and won readily, the Senatorial race in Mass.
Democrats may continue their arrogance...at their peril.
By Tom P, at
Tue Jan 19, 10:25:00 PM:
That was one seat returned to the people. How many more? And each one will be harder to take than the last, as Liberals begin to fear for themselves and their entitlements. It's a start. Now comes the hard work.
