October 11, 2004

Ground Game

All campaigns have two parts. Air game and ground game (Can't stay away from football metaphors) Air game is paid advertising, getting on the news, debates and so on. Ground game is finding voters, getting them registered, and dragging their asses to the voting both. It mostly involves bugging people, either on the phone or at their doorstep. The air game should come out to a tie. Both sides are even in money at this stage and the objective reality that benefits Kerry is balanced out by the Bush teams willingness to lie without shame. With 22 days to go the focus shifts to the ground game. Via Kos check out Red Hot Iowa ground game action:

The race here is so evenly balanced that both sides believe the outcome will be decided by an old-fashioned ground war. Kerry's team, aided by the state party, has put a huge effort into banking votes before Nov. 2 through Iowa's early voting program, which began on Sept. 23.

As of the middle of last week, about 270,000 Iowans had requested absentee ballots, Culver said. State Democratic Party officials say Democrats hold a 2 to 1 edge in those requests and an even larger advantage among those who have returned ballots.


This is good news for Donkey. Campaigns love absentee voters. Every supporter who votes early is one less person who has to be called on election day. That leaves even more time to bug the people who have not voted yet. If you live in a swing state or a place with a hot local race, vote absentee right now. They will stop bugging you. A helpful service message from Craigorian Chant.

1 comment:

Chris said...

Hey, don't forget about the Democrat's ground war for mobilizing overseas voters. Slate has a nice piece about it:
While Americans who go abroad to kill people vote Republican, Americans who go abroad to do just about anything else vote Democratic. This is the logic behind the unprecedented effort to get out the vote among U.S. civilians overseas, and the reason that effort is overwhelmingly Democratic.