Keep up the good work!

...and I KNOW that feeling. I hate the phone...and hate talking on it...and I would be terrible at making calls (ok, so I could fake it but I wouldn't be happy doing it).

BUT...at my office, the last election, there were SO many things to do. So I urge everyone to track down your local office and ask what you can do to help. I did data entry for them, putting info from people that were actually out in the field checking on voters.

My local office, in the last election, had a terrible time getting supplies (like posters, windows signs, etc.) because the demand was so high. To help (and yes, I suppose that they could be considered "bootlegged" materials) I made copies of materials that they had...must have been a couple thousand (we had old, excess, unused paper stock...and a color copier) copies for them. They were giving them out like crazy.

SO...there is so much help that everyone could do. You can do a couple hours or you could probably go in every day!

Check it out! There is such a sense of satisfaction.

http://www.democrats.org/

and the Democrats in Your State page.
Drop down list of state is on the right side...then, scroll down a bit and click in the box that has the BIG two letter state code...and finally you can use the Get Involved menu to find your local offices:

http://www.democrats.org/about/in_your_state/null

I volunteered again last night, this time to call women in low-income neighborhoods of PA. The women were randomly picked, not necessarily supporters of the President. It was depressing. Only a tiny minority were Democrats. Time and again, I got insulted and hung up on. The level of hatred against the President among some of the people out there is incredible. Over and over, I was told, "We are definitely not voting for that man," meaning the President. (Interestingly, not a single person said they supported Romney. It was always that they were against President Obama.) Worse yet, I was surrounded by a group of really sweet women also getting hung up on in the same way.

I hope my posts don't appear to be self-congratulatory. I really appreciate all the encouragement, but at some level I am being very selfish, in that I probably wouldn't volunteer if it weren't for the great feeling I get afterwards: the feeling of possibly making a difference, of taking part in something potentially historic. The reason I'm posting this is that I think it's really important that everyone who supports the president, is physically fit, and has a few hours to spare, get out there, make phone calls, knock on doors, enter data, or sit at a table to register voters. It is far from clear that we will win this. Even with all the mistakes Romney is making, there is a lot of hatred out there directed at the President. People who have suffered as a result of the economic downturn express their frustration in the form of hatred against Obama, and their hatred is probably at least partly racist. This election, given the economy, would be hard enough to win even in the absence of such hatred. Everyone, please get out there and do something.

Every now and then, a man would answer, and when I asked for the woman whose name was on my list, would ask me why I was calling. I would explain that I was a volunteer with President Obama's grassroots campaign and wanted to speak with her about the upcoming election. The man would then say something like "That won't be necessary" or inform me immediately that the woman was not interested and hang up.

I just found that really arrogant. I can't imagine too many women answering for their husbands or fathers in that way. For that matter, I can't imagine too many liberal men answering that way.