Barack Obama has sustained a historic election-year ground game that is threatening to turn the electoral map Blue in November
In football, it is a concept that has been illustrated by virtue of the teams that have won the past two Super Bowl Championships.
In the 2006-2007 NFL season, the Indianapolis Colts, long the bridesmaids to their New England Patriots counterparts, marched through the playoffs and won their first Super Bowl since moving to the Circle City. They accomplished this in no small part to the excellence of future Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning. However, even the most ardent Manning supporter will tell you that it was the Colts' ground game against Kansas City, Baltimore, New England (particularly in the second half), and in the Super Bowl against the Chicago Bears that made the difference in that team as opposed to failed playoff runs in previous years.
In last year's Super Bowl, the high-flying New England Patriots rolled into Super Bowl XLII with a record-breaking passing offense. In the end, though, it was the Patriots' inability to launch an effective ground game that turned them into a one-dimensional team that was demolished by the New York Giants' fierce pass rush. The Patriots ended the game with 16 rushing attempts for 45 yards, resulting in a paltry 2.8 yards-per-carry average. They lost the Super Bowl 17-14.
In the 2008 Presidential Election, there are two campaigns featuring ground games of their own. On one sideline, you have the Democratic Party Champion, Barack Obama (D-IL). On the other, you have Republican Party Champion, John McCain (R-AZ). Both candidates have enjoyed periods of momentary success when the pendulum moved in his direction.
Only one candidate, however, has sustained public approval and picked up strength as the general election season has pushed forward to the finish line: Barack Obama.
I live in a state that has been blood Red for as long as I have been alive: Indiana. It is a state that elected mostly conservative Democratic Party members and even more conservative Republicans. It is a state that elected George W. Bush's former Budget Director, Mitch Daniels, to be its governor. It is a state so against change that it took decades to pass Daylight Savings Time - even as many businesses begged for it during those years.
Yet as of October 4, 2008, it is a state that is dead-even when the two candidates for president, Obama and McCain, are presented to Indiana Hoosiers statewide.
In theory, this is a state that McCain should win by a very large margin. It is comprised of large numbers of rural townships with culturally-conservative, late-middle and elderly aged lifelong Republican voters. Its people have a history of rejecting anything remotely resembling change. This state should be Brady passing to Moss against Washington in 2007, when the Patriots plastered the Redskins 52-7.
This is how the state should play out - in theory. However, in reality it is McCain's lack of a ground game - any ground game - and Obama's powerful and overwhelming ground game that is steamrolling McCain in this and nearly every other battleground state in the country.
Election authority fivethirtyeight.com pointed out yesterday the vast differences between McCain's miniscule ground game and Obama's stellar organizational success (I guess that Community Organizer experience wasn't so insignificant after all). They wrote:
Obama has 40 offices now open in Missouri, and Justin Hamilton, Obama’s Press Secretary for Missouri, told us that while he couldn’t confirm below or above the published reports of 150 organizers (it didn’t come from the campaign), the campaign is only adding to its ground force. Organizers have now recruited 2500 neighborhood team leaders statewide, folks who do the far more effective work than any 30-second ad or yard signs, actual face-to-face contact and persuasion of their neighbors.
Fivethirtyeight.com also wrote:
You could take every McCain volunteer we’ve seen doing actual work in the entire trip, over six states, and it would add up to the same as Obama’s single Thornton, CO office. Or his single Durango, CO office. These ground campaigns bear no relationship to each other.
*Source: http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/
In my aforementioned home state of Indiana, the organizational differences are also profound. McCain does not have a single office open in Indiana - though he just recently said he plans to send staffers here. Obama, by comparison, has eighteen (that's 18) offices open in this state - and he has been here since well before the Indiana Democratic Party primary in May. Travel the state top-to-bottom (as I have), and you will be astounded by how many more Obama signs you see in the yards and bumper stickers on the vehicles than McCain campaign merchandise. There are endless Obama volunteers in the college towns of Muncie, Lafayette, South Bend, Bloomington, Indianapolis, and Terre Haute working several hours a week making calls, canvassing neighborhoods, and registering voters on and around the campuses.
Obama's ground game is relentless - and it is having an enormous impact on the national race and the candidates' standing in battleground states. McCain has already conceded Michigan and its 17 electoral votes (do not discount that decision's effect on voting in Northern Indiana, which is in the same media market as Southern Michigan). As of today, October 4, the other battleground states are polling as follows:
Ohio (20)
48.0
46.0
Obama +2.0
Florida (27)
48.6
45.6
Obama +3.0
Nevada (5)
49.3
47.5
Obama +1.8
Virginia (13)
49.0
46.6
Obama +2.4
North Carolina (15)
47.0
46.5
Obama +0.5
Colorado (9)
49.0
44.6
Obama +4.4
Wisconsin (10)
48.0
43.0
Obama +5.0
Minnesota (10)
49.8
44.8
Obama +5.0
New Hampshire (4)
48.4
42.8
Obama +5.6
Michigan (17)
49.1
42.1
Obama +7.0
Pennsylvania (21)
49.9
42.0
Obama +7.9
Missouri (11)
46.8
48.5
McCain +1.7
Indiana (11)
45.3
47.5
McCain +2.2
*Source: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/...
Skeptics will point out that the top five states on that list are within the margin of error - which is true. However, that fact is also true of the bottom two states. In addition, Barack Obama carries a comfortable lead of anywhere from 6-8 points nationwide - thus establishing himself as the clear front-runner to win the November Election.
There are still 31 days left until the 2008 Election. As we all know and understand, this is not a done deal and both campaigns still have much work to do in the weeks to come. However, only one campaign has deeply-rooted advantages to finish the other off as the election season winds down.
- The election narrative is and always will be about the economy. Unfortunately for the working class, The American economy has lost jobs for the ninth straight month and the financial crisis in Wall Street and Main Street continues to punish working Americans. The Republican Party is justifiably blamed for its economic policies during the last eight years. America has overwhelmingly indicated it trusts Barack Obama to lead us out of the darkness.
- Obama's ground game is suffocating McCain's ability to convince voters that he had nothing to do with the financial mess we find ourselves in. Every ad, staffer, and volunteer Obama deploys telling voters how similar Bush and McCain are on deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy weakens McCain in battleground states. When the dust settles, it will be Barack Obama's relentless effort to bring his vision for America directly to the voters via his vaunted ground game that will make him the winner of our political Super Bowl - the 2008 Presidential Election.
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