(cross-posted at Deny My Freedom and Daily Kos)
As has been my weekly habit since returning to Philadelphia, I have spent my Saturdays canvassing for PA-08 Democratic candidate Patrick Murphy, a true progressive running to unseat freshman GOP Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick in this Democratic-trending district. The most recent poll shows the race being very close, with Fitzpatrick leading Patrick by a paltry 5 percentage points. In MyDD’s latest House forecast, this race is ranked a Tier 1.5 race – it’s on the cusp of breaking into the top, but there haven’t been many polls being done on this race, and Patrick’s name ID remains relatively low in the district, which covers much of suburban Bucks County. That’s the main goal of the canvassing operation the Murphy campaign is running – Patrick’s name ID is low, so we have to let people know about him and his plan for bringing positive change to Washington. Below the fold, I’ll recount today’s soreness-inducing canvassing, which covered a lot of real estate in lower Bucks County…
Last week was a hectic weekend – not only did I hit the streets in support of Patrick, but the great guys filming Crashing The States were in town as well. I got a couple of inquiries from the campaign staff and volunteers about the final product. I honestly don’t believe any of the footage has been digitized so that it can be uploaded to the ‘Net for preliminary viewing; hopefully hekebolos will inform us all if any tidbits of the footage they’ve shot to date will be shown before they compile the documentary. The campaign headquarters also seemed a bit quieter today; there seemed to be less volunteers and staffers in the office than usual. However, a group had gone out earlier, and after we had one Penn Democrat get a crash course on the art of canvassing, we headed out to get the word out about Patrick.
Today, my canvassing partner was Josh, a fellow junior at Penn whose chosen field of study is in science and sounds a bit more complicated than anything I studied in high school. As a resident of southern New Jersey, he bemoaned the lack of Democratic politicians in the region, which has been dominated by the GOP for several years now. He’s also a fellow blogger; along with myself, he posts at the official blog of the Penn College Democrats, and he also reads MyDD – so perhaps he can add some additional thoughts once I post this entry. We went out with another canvassing team as well; both appear to be regular volunteers for the campaign (I know the name of our driver – Boris – but I forget the other guy. Apologies for doing so). I’m not sure how much they frequent the blogosphere, but they seemed to have many of the same gripes with our party that we cyber-denizens have: the Democratic Party isn’t strong enough, and the campaign being run by PA-Sen Democratic nominee Bob Casey is awful. Everyone in my car today seemed to believe Casey would lose the race despite his consistently large leads over Rick Santorum, and some were even pessimistic about the chances that the Democrats will take over either house of Congress. I am more optimistic, but to each their own opinion.
Today’s canvassing trip was to the same area I canvassed last week. It was a return to Northampton Township, and this time, I would say our lists were probably majority-Republican households. I think it’s great that we’re trying to flip the other side to vote for Patrick, who certainly has impeccable credentials. In addition, the Democratic ticket strength in Pennsylvania this year should easily help us pick up GOP votes for the down-ticket candidates. One thing that has definitely changed from last week to this week is the exponential increase in lawn signs. Both Republicans and Democrats have been planting all sorts of lawn signs throughout Bucks County, from the governor’s race all the way down to the State Assembly races. The Fitzpatrick campaign has bought billboard ads along Bristol Pike (the road that the Murphy campaign headquarters sit along), and they have smaller-sized stand-alone billboards they have set up that say ‘Elect Fitzpatrick’ – apparently, putting the ‘Re-‘ in front of ‘Elect’ was omitted, perhaps because their internal polling shows that it’s a bad time to say you’re an incumbent? Nevertheless, the more interesting factor, in my opinion, was that there were several bunches of lawn signs that grouped together the entire GOP ticket, as shown above. I can’t imagine why Fitzpatrick, who is in a tight race and has omitted his party affiliation from his signs, would make it so clear who he was aligned with by planting his signs with Lynn Swann and Rick Santorum. One volunteer with Murphy told me that the GOP campaigns for the lower-ballot races – including Fitzpatrick – actually moved their lawn signs away from Swann’s and Santorum’s signs so as to avoid the association. Clearly, they didn’t take care of every cluster of signs, as we saw many of these signs grouped together as we drove to our canvassing destination. But hey, if the Fitzpatrick campaign wants to weigh itself down with a couple of anchors, I’m all for it.
As noted above, today’s canvassing took place in Northampton Township. The neighborhood was essentially the same as last time, with it being strictly middle-upper class neighborhoods that we were targeting, except that instead of being in Holland, we were in Churchville. The only difference was that today, we had a much larger section of turf to cover; in these kinds of neighborhoods, the spaces between houses are bigger than usual, and the driveways are long, requiring a much longer distance to cover to actually reach the resident’s front door. Even though I would guess that the majority of households I canvassed today were Republicans, there were no lawn signs visible – which, I suppose, can’t be a bad thing for us. It could be an indication that the GOP base simply isn’t that enthusiastic this year.
Unlike the previous two weeks, where I got some decent response, this week was a lot of knocking on doors and receiving no response. Although it was lightly raining when we started canvassing, and it wasn’t that warm outside, I knocked on 51 doors and only received 23 contacts – and do remember that there are multiple contacts in each household. Of those 23 contacts, 8 were refusals, a number that only outpaced by those that had no opinion about the race. The response rate wasn’t that great, and unfortunately, those that did answer did not provide much data to be pleased with. As with most undecideds, they hadn’t heard of Patrick. Those that did accept the literature I handed them seemed receptive, but a great deal told me that they weren’t interested in the race. One particularly disappointing episode was a Democratic household that told me they weren’t interested in the race. The next house down – a Republican residence – was willing to at least listen to me talk about Patrick and accept the literature. Another house I went to – one that contained a Republican and a nonaffiliated voter – was more disheartening. After answering the door, I asked the man if he had heard of Patrick. “No,” he replied, smiling. “Would you like to hear about him,” I asked. “No,” he answered, still smiling. I left the porch and wondered what exactly there was to smile about. I wouldn’t be proud of showing no interest whatsoever in my democracy.
Unlike last weekend, where there were some Republicans I canvassed that said they would vote for Patrick, there wasn’t that kind of luck this time around. One household that had a Democratic voter around my age listed on it seemed like a promising opportunity. The person’s mother answered and said that she had heard of Patrick. “He’s the Democrat running for Congress,” she said, a hint of disdain in her voice. I affirmed that and spoke a little more about Patrick, but when I asked whether we could count on her support, the answer came back firmly: “No.” Josh encountered even more Republicans who would be voting for Fitzpatrick, and it appears that in this area, being a Democrat is not highly looked upon. He canvassed one household that, after inquiring about Patrick’s party affiliation, told him that they couldn’t vote for a Democrat. Another person who was driving by stopped and asked Josh if he was lost. After hearing that he was canvassing for a Democrat, the driver took off without so much as a farewell. There’s a positive phenomena I noted while looking over my canvassing sheets, though. Because the district is historically a GOP stronghold, it was of no surprise that the older voters tended to be Republicans. But the younger voters were almost solidly Democratic across the board. One household had 2 Republican parents – and 2 Democratic children. This is why the district is trending our way – the younger blood in the district is squarely blue, and as they continue to become a bigger part of the population, the more solidly Democratic southeast Pennsylvania will become.
Nevertheless, I did meet a couple of supporters of Patrick. One guy said he’d definitely be voting for Patrick. I was about to leave when he began going off on the ‘clowns’ running the government. Even though he was a Democrat, he was disgusted at what was going on, singling out Bush and Cheney for the wrongs our country faces today. In today’s environment, he said, he’d never vote for a Republican. He did note that we’d have a tough time winning here, as he noted that the district was GOP-leaning. “If that’s what people vote for, then it’s what they deserve,” he stated. However, that leadership just doesn’t affect those who vote for it…it affects all of us. That’s why I’m out every weekend, trying to make sure that the Bush agenda is stopped dead in its tracks for the next 2 years. Another elderly man I spoke to said that he’d vote for Murphy as well, stating quite clearly that he didn’t ‘like the other guy’ – Fitzpatrick. I didn’t speak with him any longer, as I had interrupted his lawn-mowing session, but it was good to hear that some people aren’t pleased with the incumbent, no matter how much of a local guy he is.
All in all, there’s still a lot of work to be done. Lack of name recognition is still the big thing that Patrick needs to overcome. Nevertheless, things are looking up for the campaign. The staffers said that the debate last Sunday between Patrick and Fitzpatrick – on Iraq and national security – went very well, and the hall it was hosted in was overflowing with people. Additionally, in line with Kos’ advice, the campaign is doing strictly cable ad buys instead of pissing away money on more expensive network advertising that reaches more people who don’t live in the district. It’s 39 days until Election Day, and the final full month of the campaign begins tomorrow. We’re going to win this.