Organizing for America

[Annie]

No offense to the Obama cheerleaders, I feel your pain:


washingtonpost.com

Obama's Machine Sputters in Effort to Push Budget
Grass-Roots Campaign Has Little Effect
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 6, 2009; A03

When his post-campaign organization was unveiled in January, Barack Obama vowed that the 13 million-strong grass-roots network built during his presidential campaign would play a "crucial role" in enacting his agenda from the White House.

"The change we've worked so hard for will not happen unless ordinary Americans get involved, and supporters like you must lead the way," Obama told backers just before his inauguration.

But in its first big test, the group dubbed Organizing for America (OFA) had little obvious impact on the debate over President Obama's budget, which passed Congress on Thursday with no Republican support and a splintering of votes among conservative Democrats. The capstone of the campaign was the delivery of 214,000 signatures to Capitol Hill, which swayed few, if any, members of Congress, according to legislative aides from both parties.....

...The organization brought Obama's massive campaign e-mail and address list under the umbrella of the DNC, which is run by Obama's handpicked chairman, Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine. The president's 2008 campaign manager, David Plouffe, acts as an outside adviser to the project. The DNC did not make Plouffe available for comment last week.

DNC financial filings give little indication of the contours of OFA, since the project's expenditures are not separated from the committee's overall operations. The effort has had no discernible impact on DNC fundraising: Total receipts were $9.9 million in the first two months of 2009, including about $3 million transferred from the Obama presidential campaign, down from $10.3 million during the same period in 2007, according to Federal Election Commission records.

The grass-roots effort on behalf of Obama's $3.5 trillion budget began in early March and was described by Plouffe as the group's "first major engagement" in the legislative process. OFA organized a door-to-door canvass effort on March 21 that netted about 100,000 pledge signatures; another 114,000 signatures came in through the group's e-mail network, the group said.

OFA trumpeted the effort as resulting in more than 640,000 pledges. But that number comes from triple-counting -- the group made three copies of pledges, one each for the signer's House member and two senators.

"If today is any indication of the support, we're going to be in very, very good shape over the next couple years," OFA director Mitch Stewart declared on Wednesday as the pledges were being distributed.

Republicans scoffed at the effort, arguing that it showed that even most diehard Obama supporters were uncertain about the wisdom of the president's budget plan. Several GOP aides noted that the number of pledges gathered online amounted to fewer than 1 percent of the names on Obama's vaunted e-mail list....

 

[DamnYankee]

No offense to the Obama cheerleaders, I feel your pain:


washingtonpost.com

Obama's Machine Sputters in Effort to Push Budget
Grass-Roots Campaign Has Little Effect
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 6, 2009; A03

Been trying to figure out the post-election campaigning, and it seems as if the machinery is a bit squeaky.... Or perhaps the roots need a little more watering....

 

[Annie]

No offense to the Obama cheerleaders, I feel your pain:


washingtonpost.com

Obama's Machine Sputters in Effort to Push Budget
Grass-Roots Campaign Has Little Effect
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 6, 2009; A03

Been trying to figure out the post-election campaigning, and it seems as if the machinery is a bit squeaky.... Or perhaps the roots need a little more watering....

I think contrary to those here, many are questioning the spending, taxing, war, and all that.

 

[editec]

No offense to the Obama cheerleaders, I feel your pain:


washingtonpost.com

Been trying to figure out the post-election campaigning, and it seems as if the machinery is a bit squeaky.... Or perhaps the roots need a little more watering....

I think contrary to those here, many are questioning the spending, taxing, war, and all that.

Damned right many people are questioning what's going on

And if you actually read people's posts here, instead of assuming that you knew what people were thinking, you'd realize that saying:

"contrary to those here"​

isn't correct, either.​

I doubt you can find a single person on this board who is happy with the bailout. Hell few of us even understand it!​

I read this board as much as you do, and I cannot find that blind support that you posts suggests exist on this board.


These Obama cheerleaders you speak of on this board, are most a fabication you're made out of political straw, honey.

​

 

[Annie]

Been trying to figure out the post-election campaigning, and it seems as if the machinery is a bit squeaky.... Or perhaps the roots need a little more watering....

I think contrary to those here, many are questioning the spending, taxing, war, and all that.

Damned right many people are questioning what's going on

And if you actually read people's posts here, instead of assuming that you knew what people were thinking, you'd realize that saying:

"contrary to those here"​

isn't correct, either.​

I doubt you can find a single person on this board who is happy with the bailout. Hell few of us even understand it!​

I read this board as much as you do, and I cannot find that blind support that you posts suggests exist on this board.


These Obama cheerleaders you speak of on this board, are most a fabication you're made out of political straw, honey.

​

Your giving your own perception hardly makes mine wrong, darling.

 

[AnnECUCherry]

OFA is not only a new concept, but at present it is operating on the state and local level solely under volunteer leadership without any resources from the DNC other than downloadable online tools.

I would suggest that the Republican response is no more than what one would expect the opposition party to say. This is nothing more than spin:

"...Republicans, who cast the relatively humble pledge campaign as a sign of broader disaffection with Obama's economic priorities." ...


"...Republicans scoffed at the effort, arguing that it showed that even most diehard Obama supporters were uncertain about the wisdom of the president's budget plan...."

Surely, nobody expected the GOP to admit that this is a potentially very effective means of politicking.