I totally stole that from Regan, by the way. I had to, because it is full of win. And it’s all political all the time here until the votes are in, so we might as well have some fun with it.
I made calls for the Obama campaign again last night, and might again tonight and tomorrow night. This election has got me edgy, and the only way I can take the edge off is to make more Get Out the Vote phone calls. Because if I’m making phone calls, I am not sitting around watching MSNBC and wondering how the state I grew up in can be so damned close to red right now.
The phonebank yesterday gave me a lot of reasons to hope. It’s what’s termed a “mega call center,” because for the first time in history, the Obama campaign is outsourcing its phonebanking in battleground states to volunteers in neighboring states. In my case, they get lots of giant spaces in New York, get as many volunteers as possible together in those places, and we make the get out the vote calls in Pennsylvania. That means that the campaign volunteers who are actually in those states can be freed up to go knocking on doors and get out the vote in person. It also means that the poor people in Pennsylvania are feeling completely besieged, because we’re calling them and knocking on doors and so are the McCain campaign people. I ended up introducing myself yesterday as a volunteer for the Obama campaign and then saying “I realize that you have probably gotten calls from everyone and their brother today,” which broke the ice because they admitted that they had and started laughing.
But anyway, my reasons for hope: when I came in at four, they had me sign in on a sheet of paper that had room for about 15-20 sign ins. They were on sheet number 21 for the day. I’ll let you do the math, because I suck at it, but people were coming in in droves. This was just one of the call centers in Brooklyn. I can only hope that all the other call centers were that busy with people who really want a change in goverment to happen tomorrow. The other thing that inspired me was that people had brought their kids along with them. I saw kids as young as 8 or 9 making phone calls because they wanted to help, too. I love the idea of getting kids involved in politics in such a real way. Let them know that they can make a difference too, educate them that their voice matters, and in ten years you will have a generation of young people who are eager to vote. I really believe that Barack Obama has the potential to do that for the next generation, and I’m glad of it. We’ve been cynical about politics for as long as I can remember, and it’s nice to see that changing.
I know we’re all tired of this election. I know we’re tired of getting bombarded with phone calls, and negative ads, and junk mail. But if we hold on for another 30 hours or so, and get out and vote, and drag our friends, family members, co-workers, neighbors, etc. out with us…we might have what we’ve been craving for a long time. Change. Don’t give up now, we are so, so close. And as Barack said, “You don’t run up *to* the finish line, you run *through* it.” Keep running, people.