Clark Kent
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11-04-2008 05:18 PM
Dave Weigel has a post over at Reason about the final hours of the Barr campaign:
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Dave Weigel has a post over at Reason about the final hours of the Barr campaign:
The call sheet is short and perfunctory, and everyone who uses it puts a slightly different spin on it. “I’m calling to ask you for your vote for former congressman and presidential candidate Bob Barr,” goes one version. “Bob Barr opposed the McCain-Obama bailout and McCain-Feingold. According to the National Taxpayers Union, only Bob Barr will cut taxes and reduce federal spending.”
Sometimes the call includes verbiage about the Second Amendment. Often, the person on the other end has something better to do.
“He already voted six weeks ago!” says Austin Petersen, a Libertarian Party worker who’s been camped out in Atlanta for the Barr campaign. “Where do they hide all these votes before the election, anyway? Are they in a box somewhere? Where’s the box?”
[...]
The office is as wide and rambling as the real estate developments that define metropolitan Georgia. A dozen people are at work, but there are almost twice as many full-stocked cubicles than staff. Typically they service the volunteers who come in on weekends to find more voters, but on the day before the election there is the hardcore staff and no one else. A flat screen TV is tuned to cable political coverage. A computer is tuned to Barr TV, which runs videos of the candidate all day long. Two Mr. Coffees churn in a small break room aside a heaving pile of lawn signs, pieces of mail, fliers, and gel bands that twist cyclist Lance Armstrong’s “Livestrong” message into “Live Free.”
“This is a real campaign,” says Stewart Flood, a South Carolina Libertarian Party executive who has taken a three-week unpaid vacation to help out. “There was no headquarters in 2004. It was Michael Badnarik in a car, driving from event to event. They did raise money, but they weren’t raising money. They did contact voters, but it wasn’t organized.”
In one of the most crowded cubicles, Barr communications director Shane Cory has a map of the country divided into seven sections. The states where Barr failed to make the ballot are blacked out. (”Louisiana screwed us,” Cory recalls grimly. “We should have gotten on in Connecticut, and we would have, if the lawsuit was filed earlier.”
Seven more states have been assigned numbers that indicate where the campaign is placing resources, which mostly consist of the candidate himself doing media and making speeches. Nevada, Colorado, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Floridaall swing statesare marked out.
Head over to Reason and read the rest of the article.Sometimes the call includes verbiage about the Second Amendment. Often, the person on the other end has something better to do.
“He already voted six weeks ago!” says Austin Petersen, a Libertarian Party worker who’s been camped out in Atlanta for the Barr campaign. “Where do they hide all these votes before the election, anyway? Are they in a box somewhere? Where’s the box?”
[...]
The office is as wide and rambling as the real estate developments that define metropolitan Georgia. A dozen people are at work, but there are almost twice as many full-stocked cubicles than staff. Typically they service the volunteers who come in on weekends to find more voters, but on the day before the election there is the hardcore staff and no one else. A flat screen TV is tuned to cable political coverage. A computer is tuned to Barr TV, which runs videos of the candidate all day long. Two Mr. Coffees churn in a small break room aside a heaving pile of lawn signs, pieces of mail, fliers, and gel bands that twist cyclist Lance Armstrong’s “Livestrong” message into “Live Free.”
“This is a real campaign,” says Stewart Flood, a South Carolina Libertarian Party executive who has taken a three-week unpaid vacation to help out. “There was no headquarters in 2004. It was Michael Badnarik in a car, driving from event to event. They did raise money, but they weren’t raising money. They did contact voters, but it wasn’t organized.”
In one of the most crowded cubicles, Barr communications director Shane Cory has a map of the country divided into seven sections. The states where Barr failed to make the ballot are blacked out. (”Louisiana screwed us,” Cory recalls grimly. “We should have gotten on in Connecticut, and we would have, if the lawsuit was filed earlier.”
Seven more states have been assigned numbers that indicate where the campaign is placing resources, which mostly consist of the candidate himself doing media and making speeches. Nevada, Colorado, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Floridaall swing statesare marked out.
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