Dartmouth College may be the only college in New Hampshire that's back from winter break, making it fertile ground for campaigns - Democratic ones, anyway.
Bill Clinton paid the school a visit Monday evening. In front of a capacity crowd (with many more not getting in), he went into full-on wonk mode and answered questions for almost two hours. The Washington Post describes "a steady stream of students," identified by the reporter as Obama supporters, leaving. And it's true, people left during Clinton's appearance, and given that the student vote is expected to be heavily for Obama, many of them would have been Obama supporters. What's also true is that they had stood and waited for a significant amount of time to get in, stood and waited once they got in, and been standing listening to Clinton for still more time, and it was dinnertime. Shoot, I left early because, as much as I hated walking out of the most up-close opportunity I will probably ever have to watch the best president of my lifetime (so far), I was exhausted.
First thing this morning, Barack Obama had a rally in the same space, restricted largely to Dartmouth students. Again it was full (I'm told students started lining up at 6:00). A few students did leave as class times approached, but the most dramatic departure was that of a student who lost consciousness and was carried out on a stretcher. This provided an interesting break in Obama's usual stump speech, and an opportunity to watch him reacting on his feet. He noticed the movement in the crowd and asked if someone had grown faint, signaling to staff to come help. As first aid providers made their way to her, he reassuringly told the crowd that it was nothing to worry about, that it happens frequently and people are usually fine with some water and rest, though often embarrassed. As it came to appear that this case might be more severe and an ambulance was called, he simply stood calmly and attentively. He didn't crack jokes or seek attention for himself.
Obama had been building to the pitch of his stump speech when this interruption occurred, and couldn't just launch back into the enthusiasm of what he had been saying. As he returned to speaking, he kept the basic material of the speech but initially adjusted the emotional tone to a slightly more somber, thoughtful one, before rebuilding. We all know he's a great speaker, but this was a display of another level, the ability not just to deliver a prepared speech well but to change the emotional register of often-used material. And at the end, he wound up right where he should be, rousing the students.
Leaving the building, the GOTV aspect of the rally was in effect, with volunteers holding signs pointing to the nearby polling place and urging students leaving the rally to go vote right then. And they were going. It won't be the only way the Obama campaign (and others) try to turn Dartmouth students out to vote today, but it was an effective start.