Canvassing for Obama in Rochester, NH

Drive for Change

I wanted to get a bunch of my friends together on a Get on the Bus style road trip to New Hampshire to volunteer for Barack Obama. That's what I wanted anyway. I invited everyone close to me that I thought had both the inclination for Obama and the interest enough in politics to volunteer.

I had canvassed Scranton, PA for Obama back on April 12th during the primary. I also wanted to get some people to go then, but I end up going solo the day after news of the "bitter" comment broke, getting paired with a Scientologist that tried to convert me, and getting a speeding ticket on the way back in Fishkill, NY, all in the name of NOT delivering PA for Obama.

I livetwittered my PA volunteering:
18 | 17 | 16 | 15 | 14 | 13 | 12 | 11 | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1

Despite my adventures in canvassing, I noticed I was having trouble recruiting for this venture. Eager to leverage the power of the web, I posted an event on the facebook:

I sent it out to all my Obama-minded friends, and got some interest, but nothing stuck. People just had other things to do. I was disappointed, to be sure, but I understand. Luckily, one man, my friend and roommate committed and was able to come with me up to New Hampshire. We stopped at Burger King on our way out of town for breakfast and headed up to Rochester, guided by my iPhone's GPS. On the road: 10AMish.

The Obama people had asked us if we could try to make it there by 10:00, but that seemed to be just out of our grasp. Fueled by breakfast sausage, Genius playlists and block-letter HOPE, we hit the Mass Pike at an eighty mile-per-hour clip. Just two and a half hours and $5.00 in tolls later, we found ourselves in Rochester, NH, a place neither of us had been before, but a place not unlike any other New England town with a historic downtown. We were struck by the incredible number of yard signs that were planted along every median, corner and public greenspace like glossy, partisan geraniums. Here is the picture we didn't take of that incredible sight:

 

 

 

We were told by the Out-of-State Obama people that the campaign headquarters was on 28 Main St, in Rochester, NH, which is on a tiny, residential street, about 2 miles from 28 North Main St., where the Strafford County Democrats office actually is. Who to blame: Google Maps for not "did you mean?"-ing me?, the Out-of-State Obama people who didn't know that Main St. and North Main St. were completely different, separated streets, or us for not doing a map reality check and flying by the seat of my iPhone's pants? The world may never know.

We found free, available public parking in downtown Rochester; a nice accommodation. Upon arrival at the Dem HQ, we were actually directed down the block to a canvassing staging area by a tiny woman name Valerie. After a few minutes of not being greeted, Paul hit the head, and I put my hands in my pockets. I sauntered over to the young(er than me, at least) lad with the Obama button, whose position behind a table was the closest thing to a position of authority. Turns out, that's the guy. We got the canvassing script, some stickers, and tons of campaign literature (complete with sample ballot!!!). We also saw that Bill Clinton, the real one, not some Clinton impersonator, was appearing in the very same Rochester, NH that we WERE ALREADY IN ON THAT VERY DAY! At noon. It was 1. We missed him; we missed this:

Paul and I zoomed out to to the addresses on our sheet, stopping first for some soul-and-hand-warming Dunkin Donuts. We overshot our target neighborhood at first, ending up in Maine. We didn't even know we were that close to the place where Paul got stitches just a few months ago.

My "OBAMA"-stickered '93 Subaru got parked on Autumn Lane, and we got to walking. No luck at the first 3 houses. At the fourth house, after a single courteous ringing of the doorbell, we hear, unmistakably, from inside: "Oh GOD! LEAVE ME ALONE!". Paul and I exchange a panicked glance but remain firm in our spot on the steps. The voice's body approaches the door and a middle aged woman in a Patriots sweatshirt answers. She's had enough of it; all of it. She explained that she'd had more unwelcome visitors in the last couple of days than Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve (*cough*). She told us that she was undecided, apparently not knowing that by insisting on this status, she'll be subject to harassment from all sides right up until the polls close. I asked, out of duty, if she'd like a piece of our campaign literature (complete with SAMPLE BALLOT!!!) and, to our surprise, she sighed, "Yes...".

That first woman was one of 9 people we actually got to say whether they were even voting out of about 50 houses. Most people weren't home, and everyone we talked to had been hit up multiple times, some even that same day. I noticed that our list was dated 10/31, and I can imagine that a two-day old list at this stage of the campaign could be very out-of-date. Paul suggested that by this point, the lists consist only of the bottom of the barrel; the people that avoid all callers, remain stubbornly undecided, or have yet to be reached at all. This was not the feel good, last minute, get-out-the-vote effort that I hoped it would be.

Most people were at the end of their ropes with the entire process. We told a few to "hang in there" and "only 2 more days". Even the Obama supporters couldn't be bothered with us. I felt that the campaign office had set us up to fail with a 2 day old list that someone had already gone through just ahead of us. We came up to New Hampshire from our solid blue state of CT to be relevant to this election, and I can't say that we did that. If NH goes for Obama, we can pretend our effort mattered, if not, we can feel like we did more harm than good.

We returned our tallies to base, and left after an unsatisfactory chat with several overcaffeinated staffers that were more interested in hearing themselves talk than our information that our people were feeling harassed and overwhelmed. Before the long haul back to Vernon, CT we reflected on our day over some excellent bison burgers at Wild Willy's in Rochester. The burgers were great.