From Michelle Obama: Some of my earliest memories - my dad as Democratic precinct captain...

[IndyOp]

Dear (IndyOp)...

My father loved this time of year.

When I was a kid, my dad volunteered as a precinct captain for the Democratic Party in our neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago. Some of my earliest memories are of tagging along as he went door to door during the campaign season.



He registered people to vote. If our neighbors needed absentee ballots, he arranged it. He helped them figure out how they'd get to the voting booth on Election Day.

It wasn't always easy. Dad was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in his early thirties. But even as it got harder for him to walk, he never let up because he believed in the value of each person's voice in the political process.

In you, I see the same commitment and determination that my father showed me on those fall afternoons on the South Side of Chicago. <snip>

You hard work is getting noticed.... And with less than 20 days left until the election, the American people are taking notice, too.

But, just at the moment when the tide is in our favor in this campaign, we can't afford to sit on our hands and take victory for granted. We've worked too hard to let up now. And we're up against a tough opponent with a lot of resources who's running a tough campaign.

So from now until November 4th, every day and every hour counts.

In asking for your support, I urge you to put aside the back-and-forth of the campaign and think about where we'll be able to take our country if Barack wins and is joined in victory by Democrats at every level... <snip>

This is the Dream that kept my father knocking on doors in our neighborhood for the Democratic Party, even when Multiple Sclerosis slowed him down. And this is the Dream we are fighting for today in this campaign.

( Letter from Michelle on behalf of the DNC - https://www.democrats.org/page/contribute?source=NETA454 )

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While I was typing this, I was thinking about how, if Frasier Robinson could go door-to-door with MS, I had no excuse not to go knock more doors over the next few weekends. At that time my local Obama HQ called me and I am signed up and will deliver myself at the appointed hour to a satellite site in my neighborhood.

:woohoo:

The guy who called was Colin, featured in this post on 538.com:

We spoke to Colin Diersing, a freshman at Bloomington South, about his involvement. He'd come in one day during the primary to help do data entry. As with every volunteer who comes to an Obama office, he was asked which time and date he could return.

Soon, an organizer asked him if he'd like to try phone calls. As is near universal, his first few calls had him a little nervous, and Colin spent ten minutes or so getting his call script comfortably into his personal voice. Then he was off to the races. At his high school, a few students got together to start the Obama group, and then each person brought two friends, and so forth, until the student group had a dedicated staff of 10-25 who regularly call and knock. Often they hit near 2000 dials in a night, the same as one of the three McCain Las Vegas, NV offices in its entirety.

Colin, Bloomington, and the building where I work are all in this slide show:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/brett538/sets/72157607802735530/show/

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/10/on-road-bloomington-indiana.html

[rurallib]

1. Damn it! Every time I read something about the Obamas or their families

I end up crying. what a truly all-American family!
I hope when I die that is one of the things i am remembered for - being a precinct captain has been a real avocation for me.
Keep up the good work. I am hoping to see Indiana blue for the first time in a long time. I have a daughter in Carmel doing some calls.

[IndyOp]

3. We will keep working. I don't know if Indiana will go blue - but we hope that

the election results remain unknown for good long while on election night - just long enough for the most of the rest of the states to come in for Obama.

:hi:

[Clio the Leo]

2. Reminds me of Rose Kennedy following her father......

... Honey Fitz as he campaigned back in Boston in the early part of the 20th century.