polarization

Based on my purely anecdotal experience (two evenings of phone calls) people do indeed seem to be feeling things more strongly. Those who don't want to be called are sick of hearing from the Obama campaign! And those who support Obama want to talk about it, mention the latest outrage from the news, talk about how much they want Obama to win, and tell me how much they dislike Sarah Palin. That's not universally true of course, but true enough that the calls are taking more time, and my pace is way down.

This intensity of emotion makes the calls easier to do, for me at least. Because for every angry "How did you get my number!" there's at least one saying how badly they want Obama to win and thanking me for volunteering. There's a sense of urgency which wasn't there before. I feel it too.

On the persuasion calls, if people support Obama we're supposed to ask them if they're going to early vote. And one guy replied, "I hadn't thought about it. What do you want us to do?" I was thrown by that, and had to think a moment before replying, "the more people vote early, that's fewer people we have to call the day before the election." "Okay," he said, "then we'll do it!" I think it's kind of hilarious that I could direct someone's voting behavior like that. I mean, who the hell am I?

Last night I did volunteer sign-ups, which is generally easier than persuasion calls because it's all people who offered at some point to volunteer. Although last night, I don't know if I had the wrong list or if the campaign is casting a wider net or what. Because a lot of these people clearly did not think they had ever expressed interest in volunteering. There were a bunch of people on the list in their 70s and 80s and even 90s (who I did not call, for crying out loud, I'm not asking elderly people to go out canvassing!) One guy even said "Good for you. You've got my money, and you've got my vote, and now you want my time too?" Which sounds like a pretty bad call but I apologized, thanked him for all the support he'd already given, and said I would try to get his name off the list. Then he warmed up quite a bit. I always try to get people off the list if they're clearly not interested. I don't want to piss people off, especially if they're strong enough supporters to donate.

He told me his two daughters had moved -- one within North Carolina and one to Maryland -- and asked me what they needed to do. I told him that the one in North Carolina needed to re-register at her new address so she could be assigned to the right voting location. Then I .. well I kind of elided the truth. "If she moved up there permanently, then she should register in Maryland and vote up there. If it were temporary, for college or something, then she could request an absentee ballot and vote down here. And North Carolina is a lot closer than Maryland this year. But if the move is permanent, then I have to tell you that she should register up there." I think he understood what I was saying because he asked me how to get the absentee ballot.

There were also people whose willingness to help amazed me: like the man who has Parkinson's disease, bad enough that I had difficulty understanding him, but wants to do office work. Or the woman with a small baby and no reliable child care, who can't commit blocks of time, but promised she would use the website to make phone calls and take her baby out on "neighbor to neighbor" canvassing walks. She said she was from Chicago and Obama had been her state senator! She met him 10 years ago, she said they were in the same neighborhood.