obama volunteers told to share "conversion stories"

[Azazello1313]

 

"He looked at me, and the look in his eyes was worth 1,000 words," said Mack, now a regional field organizer. Obama hugged her and whispered something in her ear – she was so thrilled she doesn't remember what it was.

 

Then Mack brought home the point of her story for the crowd of 100 or so eager volunteers, sipping coffee and watching a PowerPoint presentation in the Obama campaign office on a recent Saturday.

 

"Did that make more impact on you than if I had talked about his health care plan or his stance on the environment?" she asked.

 

On the verge of a hectic few weeks leading to Super Tuesday, the crucial Feb. 5 multistate primary including California's, Mack wanted to drill home one of the campaign's key strategies: telling potential voters personal stories of political conversion.

 

She urged volunteers to hone their own stories of how they came to Obama – something they could compress into 30 seconds on the phone.

 

"Work on that, refine that, say it in the mirror," she said. "Get it down."

 

She told the volunteers that potential voters would no doubt confront them with policy questions. Mack's direction: Don't go there. Refer them to Obama's Web site, which includes enough material to sate any wonk.

 

The idea behind the personal narratives is to reclaim "values" politics from the Republican Party, said Marshall Ganz, a one-time labor organizer for Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers who developed "Camp Obama" training sessions for volunteers.

 

When people tell their stories of how they made choices and what motivates them, they communicate their values, Ganz said in an interview.

 

i have to say, that little story pretty much encapsulates what people seem to like about obama, but also what makes a lot of people uneasy about him (rightly so, IMO). his candidacy is built on bromides about "hope" and "change" and little else. we're not electing a motivational speaker here. leap of faith?

[Puddy]

Getting nervous

[TimC]

I can't wait to hear how that one-hit wonder band from 1976, Cap'n Grunge and the Liberals, came to Obama.

Edited January 30, 2008 by TimC

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

And Reagan was known as the great communicator.

 

I get it Az, you don't want to be suckered by rhetoric. I understand. At the same time I don't think policy differences are all that much in the Democratic party at this point which does leave leadership style important. You can have all the ideas in the world, but if you don't know how to implement them, you ain't peaches by the bucket.

[Yukon Cornelius]

whom ever god tells me to vote for i will vote for....

[Pope Flick]

This really isn't that unusual in this day and age.

 

Keep in mind the situations new volunteers find themselves in: for instance, when I worked on the Wes Clark campaign in 2004, one of his most thought out planks of his platform was tort reform, which was something I've never really considered 'high on my list.' So imagine if someone like Az (who's practicing to be a lawyer) comes along and asks me about Clark's tort reform positions. Now, as a recent volunteer ask yourself -honestly- what would you rather hear: a stammering response from a volunteer who had other priorities that attracted him to that candidate, or >gasp< a 21st century response of providing a link to a pdf that ran several pages. Adopting the latter as a campaign wide policy isn't shady it's consistently getting you to the best source of information: the candidates own writings.

 

Expecting new volunteers to be able to encompass a candidate's entire platform in a matter of days isn't being realistic, especially when there are tools out there to provide solid reasoned answers for your questions.

 

Past that, let's face it: Obama is running a visceral campaign, the likes of which you usually don't see, much less succeed as well as it has to this point.

[Azazello1313]

This really isn't that unusual in this day and age.

 

so which other candidates are specifically instructing their volunteers not to talk about policy?

[Azazello1313]

You can have all the ideas in the world, but if you don't know how to implement them, you ain't peaches by the bucket.

 

i guess i'm wondering whether obama knows how to implement them. am i just supposed to take it on faith that he's a uniter, not a divider?

[Pope Flick]

so which other candidates are specifically instructing their volunteers not to talk about policy?

Answer my question first:

 

ask yourself -honestly- what would you rather hear: a stammering response from a volunteer who had other priorities that attracted him to that candidate, or >gasp< a 21st century response of providing a link to a pdf that ran several pages

 

TIA.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

i guess i'm wondering whether obama knows how to implement them. am i just supposed to take it on faith that he's a uniter, not a divider?

 

Voting for any candidate is a leap of faith period. You are not guaranteed anything. You take your most educated stab at who you think would do the best job as the leader of the free world.

[Azazello1313]

Answer my question first:

TIA.

 

i think at the very least it is a good idea for people calling on a candidate's behalf to be somewhat versed on the candidates actual positions, and probably at the very least to be provided with a "cheat sheet" of talking points that spells out where they stand and where they differ from other candidates. that just seems common sense and obvious to me, if you're going to call someone to ask them to vote for your guy, you ought to be able to talk about "why". if you're too stupid to handle that, maybe they should put you on yard sign duty or something. of course it's a great idea to throw in the whole "if you'd like more information about our plan, we encourage you to read the info on our website, which goes into much more detail". but that's a far cry from telling folks specifically to AVOID talking about the issues.

[Pope Flick]

i think at the very least it is a good idea for people calling on a candidate's behalf to be somewhat versed on the candidates actual positions, and probably at the very least to be provided with a "cheat sheet" of talking points that spells out where they stand and where they differ from other candidates. that just seems common sense and obvious to me, if you're going to call someone to ask them to vote for your guy, you ought to be able to talk about "why". if you're too stupid to handle that, maybe they should put you on yard sign duty or something. of course it's a great idea to throw in the whole "if you'd like more information about our plan, we encourage you to read the info on our website, which goes into much more detail". but that's a far cry from telling folks specifically to AVOID talking about the issues.

 

 

Fair enough. But I also think it's unrealistic to expect recent volunteers to memorize a volume of information to answer any potential question in a short amount of time.

 

I skimmed through the article before, but for some reason now it's behind a subscription window.

 

I will also respectfully submit that even a 'cheat sheet' would seem disengenuous, at least to me. If you ask a pointed question about an issue that's important to you do you want to hear a rehearsed, bullet point style answer by a college kid who's flipping through a couple of index cards or would you rather be steered towards a more detailed response by the candidate themselves?

 

I think this tactic is reflective of the nature of his campaign, which you alluded to earlier. They're not avoiding answering, but trying to provide as substantial answer. Trying to be a 'know it all' might be beyond someo f the newbies to the campaign. And I'll also honestly say that the campaign managers certainly better be able to answer most if not all policy questions off the cuff with decent detail and not adopt the 'here's a link' for themselves as well. I'm willing to give newbies a pass, and don't understand why you are shocked -SHOCKED I tell you!- that they're being steered clear of cramming to stumble through in depth answers.

 

And to answer your question: I don't know, but wouldn't be surprised if more candidates begin doing this. Campaigns, IMO are a little behind the times in using the internet as tools beyond basic blogging.

Edited January 30, 2008 by Pope Flick

[Ursa Majoris]

Voting for any candidate is a leap of faith period. You are not guaranteed anything. You take your most educated stab at who you think would do the best job as the leader of the free world.

Good answer. I think we vote for whoever we think is likely to do the best job as leader of the free world AND at the same time lying the least.

[Azazello1313]

Voting for any candidate is a leap of faith period. You are not guaranteed anything. You take your most educated stab at who you think would do the best job as the leader of the free world.

 

and with obama your "education" consists of...what exactly? the fact that he sounds nice talking?

 

I'm willing to give newbies a pass, and don't understand why you are shocked -SHOCKED I tell you!- that they're being steered clear of cramming to stumble through in depth answers.

 

i'm not shocked at all. like i said, it seems illustrative of his whole campaign...long on wind, short on substance.

Edited January 30, 2008 by Azazello1313

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

and with obama your "education" consists of...what exactly? the fact that he sounds nice talking?

i'm not shocked at all. like i said, it seems illustrative of his whole campaign...long on wind, short on substance.

 

He also writes nicely. I'm in the middle of his latest book. Tell me, how are you educating yourself Az?

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

and with obama your "education" consists of...what exactly? the fact that he sounds nice talking?

i'm not shocked at all. like i said, it seems illustrative of his whole campaign...long on wind, short on substance.

 

I think you are caught up in the fact that he does indeed "talk pretty" and drawing a conclusion based solely on campaign speeches that there must be nothing there because so.

 

Please demonstrate how any of the other campaigns, either R or D, have more substantive policy proposals than the Obama campaign.

 

At this point in the game, there is broad rhetoric everywhere from every campaign. Just because Barack doesn't state 12 points in a stump speech doesn't mean his ideas are any more or less fleshed out than the other front runners in either party.

[Azazello1313]

question: please name one thing that obama has accomplished.

 

pro-obama focus group: ummmmm........

 

edit to add: i couldn't quite make out the haircut, but was that grunge saying, "he's a great ora-tater like jesse jackson"

Edited February 5, 2008 by Azazello1313

[bushwacked]

question: please name one thing that obama has accomplished.

 

pro-obama focus group: ummmmm........

 

edit to add: i couldn't quite make out the haircut, but was that grunge saying, "he's a great ora-tater like jesse jackson"

 

 

Kind of weird how lack of experience wasn't that big of an "issue" for you in the 2000 elections.

[billay]

Kind of weird how lack of experience wasn't that big of an "issue" for you in the 2000 elections.

Remember, this is the guy who thinks that cornpone platitudes won't "go far" in american politics.

Edited February 5, 2008 by billay

[Azazello1313]

george bush won me over because he is a great ora-tater, too

Edited February 5, 2008 by Azazello1313

[Pope Flick]

You pulled something from Fox? Fair and balanced indeed.

[Azazello1313]

You pulled something from Fox? Fair and balanced indeed.

 

 

the little fox i've seen lately has been far more sympathetic to obama than to hillary.

 

are you saying those are fake obama supporters?

[HowboutthemCowboys]

Good answer. I think we vote for whoever we think is likely to do the best job as leader of the free world AND at the same time lying the least.

this is true, and very sad when you think about it.

[Pope Flick]

 

the little fox i've seen lately has been far more sympathetic to obama than to hillary.

are you saying those are fake obama supporters?

 

 

No. I am saying anything from Fox purporting to be "news" regarding the democrats certainly needs to be taken with a very large grain of salt.This is the same network that quite simply made up stories about Obama already.I could care less about what they show regarding him moving forward. How do we know they haven't edited out a response that would have answered their question? The answer to that is we don't and they've certainly shown no integrity in the past regarding his candidacy.

[Azazello1313]

No. I am saying anything from Fox purporting to be "news" regarding the democrats certainly needs to be taken with a very large grain of salt.

 

that wasn't a second hand "news" report. that was a pollster sticking a mic in front of a bunch of typical obama supporters (that is, after all, exactly what a focus group strives to be) and asking them to name an accomplishment of his on live TV. the response is what it is.