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Seeing Marc Miller hover over a stack of papers
scribbling energetically, you might think he’s doing his taxes or
cramming for a midterm that starts in 10 minutes. Instead, Miller, a volunteer for U.S. Sen. Barack
Obama’s presidential campaign, is tallying the number of potential
voters he’s talked to and assigning them codes based on their
presidential preferences in the Iowa Democratic caucus. As far as
Miller’s concerned, that task is almost as important as completing
his 1040 for the IRS.
“After seven years of George Bush, the country
needs to change,” Miller says. The Iowa caucus, which will be held Jan. 3, is the
first major test in next year’s presidential race, and Obama
volunteers from next-door Illinois are spending lots of time there now.
Polls show Obama a strong second to frontrunner Hillary Clinton in Iowa;
analysts say the Illinois senator needs to do well there to have a fighting
chance in New Hampshire. Miller and his wife, Debbie, of Springfield, spent
this past Saturday in Bettendorf along with 130 other central-Illinois
volunteers as part of what the Obama campaign touted as the largest
pre-primary canvass in Hawkeye State history. By rapping on the doors of
65,000 voters, Obama for America hoped to reach the same number of people
who attended Iowa’s 2004 caucuses, in which U.S. Sen. John Kerry,
D-Mass., bested all opponents, including former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean,
the previous frontrunner, and went on to take the party’s nomination.
Volunteers from Springfield, Petersburg, Pekin,
Bloomington-Normal, Peoria, and Champaign-Urbana arrived in Iowa around
noon Saturday, Nov. 3 — just two months before the caucus and one
year before the 2008 general election. Canvassers received a kit containing a map, a list of
Democratic voters, blank pledge cards, fliers announcing an upcoming Obama
speech, and other literature. The volunteers were asked to “have good
conversations at doors about Barack Obama” and to ask voters whether
they planned to caucus, whether they had a favorite candidate, and what
issues they cared about and to make records of each encounter so the
campaign could follow up later.
Iowans apparently take their jobs as caucus-goers
seriously. “There’s a lot not to choose from,”
says one man with a yellow mustache and a carton of Marlboros in the front
seat of his pickup. Another voter, who was blowing fallen leaves from his
yard when Debbie and Marc approached him, says he waits until after the
first of the year, after the field narrows, to make up his mind. “Right now, everybody’s got a good
idea,” he says. Volunteer Olivia Dorothy, also a Springfield
resident, says one voter told her he’d support whichever candidate
knocked on his door the most: “People appreciate that personal
touch,” she says. However, many voters who said they planned to attend
the caucus had not formed an opinion about the candidates, didn’t
want to be bothered on an exceptional autumn afternoon, or simply chose to
keep it to themselves. “I’m undecided,” one gentleman said
to the Millers. Marc told his wife: “That’s good.
We’ve got hope.”
Contact R.L. Nave at rnave@illinois.com.
This article appears in Nov 1-7, 2007.
