Yesterday I went to a Democratic Party political meeting. I actually misunderstood. I thought the meeting was just
organizational, but it was actually a door to door canvassing exercise. Since I had other commitments, and besides
had not worn my sneakers [essential for me if I am going to walk long
distances] I just signed up, stayed for the prep session, and then left. There will be lots of other opportunities. But I wanted to tell you about it because it
captures something essential and rather charming about American politics.
North Carolina has somewhat more than ten million residents,
which is not nothing – it is the 9th most populous state – but it is
not exactly California. There are 100
counties in North Carolina, and this meeting was in Chatham County, where I
live. But it was not a meeting called by
the Chatham County Democratic Party. Nothing
so grand. It was a meeting called by the
Democratic Party of the North Williams Precinct, one of 18 precincts in Chatham
County. We met in the parking lot of the
North Chatham Elementary School on Lystra Road.
Roughly two dozen volunteers showed up. They were all White, even though both the
State Rep and the State Senator representing this area are Black [and of course
Democrats], and perhaps two-thirds were women.
I saw one or two young people, but most were my side of fifty. The plan for the day was to knock on the
doors of 350 or so reliably Democratic voters who scored high on someone’s
measure of Likelihood to Volunteer. The
idea was to recruit as many volunteers as possible for future political work.
Americans are friendly folk, quick to make friendships, or
at least acquaintanceships, typically on a first name basis. People at the meeting divided readily into
pairs, each equipped with a map of several streets with lists of prospects and
red dots identifying their residences [this is a product of a program called
VoteBuilder which I first encountered when doing political work in the 2008
campaign.] Then they took off to canvass.
This kind of campaigning is extremely labor intensive [most
people are not home on any given day] and depends on volunteers willing to plug
away at the lists. It would not be
uncommon for a pair of the doorbell ringers at that meeting to round up only two or three volunteers
in several hours of work.
This is what politics is like at ground level, and if we are
to have any chance of turning North Carolina blue fifteen months from now, it
will take uncounted hours of grunt work by thousands of volunteers like the
folks who showed up yesterday. That is
exactly as it should be in a democracy.
7 comments:
"This is what politics is like at ground level, and if we are to have any chance of turning North Carolina blue fifteen months from now, it will take uncounted hours of grunt work by thousands of volunteers like the folks who showed up yesterday. That is exactly as it should be in a democracy."
You sound like Howard Zinn! :)
Given your historical knowledge of America, are you a fan of his work? I loved A People's History of America, but I've seen a lot of people - left and right - disparage the book.
I read Zinn when I was in university and found it a useful corrective to much of what I'd learned of US history. Zinn was not a historian, however, and my understanding is that actual historians view Zinn's work as overly simplistic and didactic.
TDD.
Zinn, uhm, most certainly was a historian. I mean that literally: he had a phd in history and was a professor at Spellman College and Boston University. he also published prodigiously.
But you're right, OTHER HISTORIANS accuse his book of being overly simplistic or false. That's why I was asking Professor Wolff what he thinks of it.
Abe Lincoln, in answer to a question about how he won his races said, "I find 'em and I vote 'em." Bernie Sanders won, by 2 votes, his race for Mayor of Burlington, VT, by following Abe's advice. His campaign was the first in Vermont to put voter rolls on a computer and manage voter ID and GOTV with Lotus123, and the data management programs of the day. A couple of years later I was the field director for Sen. Pat Leahy's reelection campaign. We put the voter lists of every town on a mainframe the campaign bought. This made voter ID, GOTV, managing fund raising, preparing Federal filings, etc. absurdly easier. Leahy had learned from Sanders' success.
In a more contemporary vein, Obama had the best field organization in modern political history. HRC failed to follow that lead and understaffed Michigan and Wisconsin. As a result she didn't know her support was weak, resulting in her ignoring those state after the convention. Trump campaigned extensively there.
So serious props to Dr. Wolff for being involved in this work!
Apologies for my mistake - I had thought Zinn had trained as a sociologist (not sure where I got that idea); per Wikipedia, he was indeed a History professor. Learn something new every day!
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As a philosophy professor should you not be arguing for your conclusion rather than just stating it?
PS. Retirement does not excuse you from this requirement!
PPS. Keep up the good work. The American people deserve better than this odious President.
Joe in London, UK
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