This is not a quantitative analysis of any kind, but I thought to share several impressions I came away with after a day of canvassing for Senator Obama in Northern Virginia with a friend. One is that in this likely Obama bastion enthusiasm seems to be surging for the Illinois Senator among undecideds. Second, volunteers needed to stay "hungry" and ensure the huge Northern VA effort that is the key to victory.
Northern Virginia is of course the area where Obama hopes to win by large enough margins to carry the state. In that sense, this was not like canvassing a true battleground neighborhood. My friend and I had some experience of this in the past, notably Orlando in Central Florida in 2000 for Gore-Lieberman and Lehigh Valley, PA, in 2004 for Kerry-Edwards. This canvassing instead was intended to tease out as many Obama supporters as we could from an area where Obama was expected to win handily.
The area we canvassed was in the Alexandria area of Fairfax County, Virginia, a quite well-to-do area of single-family dwellings (we guessed most homes started at half a million). Not too many for-sale or for-rent signs, a well-tended area with nice cars, some kids in the street, e.g. generally prosperous looking. Beautiful weather made the three hours it took to cover the 70 or so homes we visited go by fast.
Prior to setting out, the volunteer coordinator for the Obama campaign advised us we would be canvassing potential voters who had already been solicited twice, once by phone and once in person, but who remained undecided, refused to answer or had otherwise been unavailable. In other words, we were identifying Obama supporters from the diminishing pool of voters that had not already declared. We were further advised not to be surprised at some negative reactions since these were not identified supporters, and that they had been happy with getting 2 new supporter households (there are multiple voters in each household, generally) out of each pass of an area like this.
We had about 15 household contacts total, the rest being not-at-homes for whom an Obama-Warner-Moran flyer was left.
We got 8 new Obama households. When we returned with this news to the Obama coordinator, we were gratified by the surprise it elicited from her. These results left an impression on us as well.
The people who advised they were now Obama supporters made it known in no uncertain terms, with assertive declarations and smiles being the norm. Some households remained split, with an undecided or McCain backer amongst them, but there were only 2-3 of these.
We had about 5 households where people advised they were still either undecided or unwilling to answer. Of the remaining two households, one was a Democrat who was clearly hostile to Obama and the others were Republicans moving into the McCain column. They were not open to being persuaded, despite our gentle offer. We smiled, thanked them for their time, and moved on.
By nature I am an electoral pessimist, which is not hard to be when one is a Democrat and especially when it is a Presidential election.
But my friend and I found it heartening that more households than expected by the campaign had now moved into being Obama supporters. Granted, this is an Obama stronghold we were canvassing. But good news nonetheless.
My innate pessimism requires one further comment. With only a month remaining, and with all the other factors in play for Obama, it troubled me that seven other households we contacted remained undeclared or pro-McCain. We will need every single vote squeezed out of Northern Virginia to prevail. While the canvassing left a promising impression of Obama's chances of winning huge in Northern Virginia, a great amount of work remains to be done in order to carry it by the margins we will need.
One last note. As a former Hillary supporter who had worked as a volunteer for a number of campaigns in the past (starting in 1972) this was my first contact with the Obama campaign. I was favorably impressed by their combination of enthusiasm, know-how and willingness to expend elbow grease.