It's Ohio Time, Baby

What better time to revitalize this blog than with the Ohio Primary coming up in a little under a Month...

March 4 will be a huge day for the Democratic campaign. Though it was recently (like earlier today) announced that Romney is suspending his campaign--and will likely drop out because of his shortcomings on SuperTuesday--the Democrat nomination is in a dead heat, and Ohio is the next battleground...how fantastic for us.

Obama said this morning that he does not want to debate Hillary in Ohio and would prefer spending time talking to the voters. This is a very interesting tactic, especially coming on the heels of a very friendly debate in California. It seems his campaign seems to be struggling with how to stay positive while still distinguishing himself enough from Clinton to garner support. He is an incredibly charismatic candidate (I relish listening to his speeches. Honestly, I bark for quiet at those talking around me and get goosebumps every two minutes or so...I LOVE listening to that man talk!) Maybe he thinks that by using his charisma and his charm and his eloquence, he can still play the game on his terms and get more support rather than re-hasing a bunch of answers in a debate that people already know about the candidates. It's an interesting request...we'll see where it goes...

Around campus, it seems that most of the people I've talked to are at least knowledgeable about the candidates. It's sad to think that many people have not been paying even the slightest amount of attention to the race, especially on the (more exciting I would of course argue) Democratic side. The two candidates are both incredible leaders...it's a matter of who can take over on the national scale. This could very well be a race that goes to the convention--but Ohio will play a major factor in deciding the candidates outcomes.

I recently registered to vote in Ohio. I guess I kept holding out hope that maybe I could get more Democrats elected in Indiana...but after losing our Democratic mayor I was so proud of, I decided I'll register in a state where my vote could actually make a difference.

-Briana

Moment to brag

Many of the students who attended the trip to Iowa this past weekend have been included in on websites (I believe there's some Obama stuff...when I find it I'll post it...) and been asked many questions about the trip for both the Newswire and the Xavier Muskie News among other channels.

Well, there was apparently a NY Times photographer at the Edwards events we attended in Iowa. So! Here's my moment to brag...I found myself (though it's not obvious to anyone but me, really) in two of the pictures on the NY Times online website under the Edwards Multimedia slideshow. The links to the pictures are here:

In this picture, I am in very middle in the far background. You can see my gray sweater and colorful scarf. I like the main woman's John Edwards Superman button.

In this one, I'm the shoulder he's about to put his hand on. You can tell by the scarf again! How exciting!

~Briana Hansen

Still Recovering

This is a picture of the Edwards Team doing "visibility." For those of you watching the weather, there was a big snow storm in Iowa on Saturday. It was a good and a bad thing...on the one hand, some of us got a chance to be a little closer to the candidates because not as many people came out. On the other, it was--well--a snow storm. This is a group of us out in the pouring cold cheering for Edwards.



These visibilities are a funny thing, because they're often small groups of young people cheering on their candidate with clever cheers. The Obama people were across the street and when they were done doing a cheer, we would start chanting for Edwards. One of the Edwards cheers I remember was "We love Elizabeth and we love John! We want to see them on the White House lawn!"

One of the staffers actually told me about this thing called a "sign war" that took place a couple weeks before we came. Each candidates team gets a set amount of time to put up as many signs supporting the candidate as possible. There can only be one person from the team inside the hall at any given time, and the teams have to tag in and out as they come to decorate. He talked about it really enthusiastically and it made me think about how encouraging it is that so many young people are still involved in the campaign process. In a world where our generation often comes across as apathetic and jaded towards the political process, it's really neat that there are games and structures in place to keep young folks involved. Though the process of choosing the person who may lead the free world is not a game, at least those involved in the long, tedious, difficult jobs of doing much of the brunt work behind the candidate find ways to keep their spirits up.

-Briana Hansen

Super Saturday

Yesterday was filled with so much excitement, I'm still trying to recover from it all. Though I don't have much time right now, I wanted to say that I got the opportunity (with the rest of the Edwards team) to go to a forum with the Senator, then breifly talk to him afterwards and get a picture with our group. Afterwards, we did a visibility event for a while before attending a "Community Values Forum" with five of the Democratic candidates. It was a packed day filled with fun and interesting lessons and reflections.

More to come in the next couple days...

~Briana Hansen

At Obama HQ

My name is Greg Koehler. I am a senior PPP major at Xavier, and I just thought I would check in and relate my brief experience with the Obama campaign last night. I was supposed to work with the Biden campaign the entire weekend, but instead the Biden volunteers spent Friday evening working for Obama due to minor scheduling complications.

Obama HQ was abuzz with life. Most (but certainly not all) of the workers are young, twentysomething devotees of the Senator, evidently having the time of their lives, despite the outrageous hours they have to put in. You can tell that they eat, sleep, and breathe this stuff, and they exude a sense of hope for the future that's contagious.

Most of us were put to work making phone calls, while another several were put on envelope stuffing and addressing postcards. Some people might be disappointed with those kind of peon jobs, but what you have to remember is that someone has to do the crappy jobs, and they may as well be done by the untrained volunteers. Besides, what's really fun about going to a big campaign headquarters is just experiencing the inside of the beehive. I love chatting with the people and and asking them about their work. I was dead tired from the bus ride, but somehow I managed to feed off of the energy, and the evening reaffirmed my belief that politics isn't dead in America. It's certainly alive and kicking here in Des Moines, Iowa.

Greg Koehler, '08