Moving Iowa Forward: Yes We Can!
Don't Give up on Hope!
Quotes from the Obama rally tonight in Ohio:
Columbus mayor Michael Coleman:
35,000 at the Ohio rally…the largest gathering of President Obama's presidency.
They're shouting “Yes We Can” now… Michelle says, “…we've gotta let this man speak… asks the crowd, can we do this? Are you fired up and ready to go? Then it is my honor to introduce my husband, the President of the United States, Barack Obama!”
“In two weeks you have the chance to say again, yes we can…GOP counting on you to forget who caused the mess in the first place…they would like you to believe it's a referendum on me…they don't want you to understand that this election is a choice…..and the stakes couldn't be higher…
…if they win this election the GOP has promised that they will pursue the exact same agenda as they did before..and we know what that is…cut taxes for millionaires and billionaires…no rules for Wall St., cut middle class loose to fend for themselves…you're on your own…the agenda that turned a record surplus into a record deficit…an agenda that let Wall St. run wild and nearly destroyed the economy…do they think that we've forgotten?
…They want to cut education by 20% to pay for a billion dollar tax cut for 2% of Americans…it is up to you to tell them you do not want what they are selling…we've been there before and we're not going back..
Republicans, you can't have the keys back, you don't know how to drive..if you want, you can roll with us but you gotta be in the back seat…to take the car forward you put it in D, if you want to go backwards, put it in R…we don't want to go backwards, we're taking this country forward…
the other side is pouring tens of millions of dollars into misleading ads across the country attacking Democrats…they don't have the courage to disclose their identity…this isn't just a threat to Democrats, this is a threat to our democracy…and the only way to beat them is by all of your voices coming together to finish what we started…
that's why you need to vote in this election…you can play a role in making change..now we're doing the hard work of change, inch by inch, day by day…it's not easy…believe me, I know it's not easy…but don't let anybody tell you this fight isn't worth it, don't let them tell you you're not making a difference…
…because of you, 100,000 brave men and women are no longer fighting a war in Iraq…a woman with cancer now is getting health care…young people are going to college who would not have been able to, because of you…
…nothing in America has been easy; the very founding required a revolution… legacy of slavery, a civil war…we had to fight to make sure women got the right to vote…for workers to get a decent deal…we had to fight…and each and every time there was somebody who said you can't do that, you're wasting your time…somebody who was saying change isn't going to happen…
…the only reason we're here is because past generations have been unafraid to push forward even in the face of difficulty..
if you will recapture that spirit, if you are out there knocking on doors, making phone calls, talking to friends and neighbors…
… if you do not give up hope, I guarantee you that not only are we going to win this election, we will build a movement for change that will last ten years from now, twenty years from now, grow this economy, restore the middle class to its rightful place and once again the American Dream will be alive and well. God bless you, Ohio, and God bless the United States of America.” ~
I door-knocked today. I was given an assignment last week to call about 20 Democrats in my precinct to recruit volunteers to participate in a precinct canvass today. I had a helluva time reaching busy families. Some I called 2 or 3 times. I was discouraged when Saturday came and no one had returned my call or agreed to help out.
So I went to the training at Johnson County Democrats HQ on Sunday afternoon anyway, and found a packed, standing-room-only room of energized Democrats. The staffers were flanked by state Senator Bob Dvorsky and state Representative Mary Mascher.. They could not have been plainer that it is now all about getting the 2008 Democratic voters back to the polls and this means getting a ton of people to volunteer to call, door-knock and chase ballots…. To do this they were giving a hard ask to the room to commit to signing up on the spot for some of the shifts that need to be filled the weekend prior to election day, to do the hard work of Democracy…filling the GOTV calling/canvassing slots during the four days, Friday through Monday preceding the election and also on election day. I turned in my card after signing up for four 3-hour shifts each day over the 4-day period.
At the end, on my way out of the room, a volunteer approached me who I recognized as someone I had called for today's canvass. She told me she had just signed up to cover several GOTV shifts on the weekend prior to the election. She thanked me for calling her. She said if I had not called her, she wouldn't have come to the training today and probably would not have volunteered.
One person. But that one person is now engaged and committed to giving several hours of work for Democracy. To me, that was worth making a bunch of phone calls to people who would not call back or said no. So, between now and election day, I'll be out there again, every free hour I have, door-knocking and calling. And I'll be at the Johnson County Dem. HQ the weekend before the election working my 4 shifts.
The stakes are too high to let the Republicans have another shot at ruining everything they can get their hands on. I don't want to wake up on the morning after, with Terry Branstad in the governor's office and a GOP-controlled House of Representatives.
So I'm not giving up on hope. And I hope everyone who reads this blog will not give up on hope either, and will take some time away from the computer to volunteer at your county Democratic headquarters over the next couple of weeks. It's a small price to pay for Democracy.
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