I went canvassing for most of the morning out here in Bellevue on Mercer Island, a wealthy portion of this very tech-heavy district (which also has chunks of blue collar rural precincts that comprise the Republican base). August in the northwest is usually the best time of year, sunny and bright but fairly cool. There's something of a heat wave, which means it's in the 80s and humid, and this is an extremely outdoorsy suburban culture. The picture above was from a garden of one of the huge houses near the lake, where they even put their growing pears in bags so animals wouldn't eat them.
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| Anyway, I went out canvassing with a brilliant staffer of the campaign Sam Lewis, an Oberlin student and commenter on OpenLeft. We drove and walked around for three or four hours, knocking on doors, doing lit drops, and talking to possible voters. This was a straight up GOTV canvass with no persuasion to prepare for the primary on Tuesday.
I go canvassing a lot, and do phone banking fairly frequently for various candidates. My first experiences in politics were going to the Kerry campaign in Boston three or four days a week after work in 2003 and phone banking into New Hampshire for a few hours each time, explaining to antiwar voters why Kerry had voted for the war and was the best choice anyway. These voters mostly wanted to know why I was calling them a year ahead of the primary, though I did get the occasional angry voter who didn't like Kerry's vote on the war. It was obvious at that time talking to voters that there was a big opening for Dean.
One time I was phone banking for Lamont in 2006, and ended up talking to a person who had read my coverage of the campaign. Normally phone banking is kind of terrifying, so that was comforting. What you learn when canvassing or reaching out to voters is that people just hate politics and are afraid of contact from people they don't know. It's incredibly lonely work, especially canvassing in suburban neighborhoods. There is no one around except for people in passing cars, usually there are barking dogs in at least one or two houses you approach, it's hard to find houses, and people are afraid of you.
Today I accidentally pulled into someone's secluded driveway, and a man stood in his window glaring at us with his arms crossed until I was able to back out. Canvassing in urban areas or in public spaces - like metro stops - is very different. There are large public places where people expect to encounter other people, and it's a much friendlier vibe even though and probably because there are crowds.
All of this is to say that walkable neighborhoods and public spaces are very good for politics. As most of the country is suburban, it is very hard to find public spaces where politics can be conducted. Robocalls, TV ads, radio ads, direct mail, and phone banks are all proxies for a lack of civic culture, in which pestering voters with jackhammer-like messaging screaming IRAQ or TAXES takes the place of engaging with people in real conversations. This kind of politics is literally built into the fabric of the suburbs, which is one reason why certain types of authoritarian messaging works really well in both the Democratic and Republican parties. The web functions differently, based on varying levels of trust, but that is not how relating to the general electorate operates.
Anyway, that's my experience. Canvassing is a really useful exercise, but it can hardly be called 'fun'. |
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