Keep on rocking in the free world

Pictured above is a photo taken by Chris at the Obama rally in Orlando...we were really that close!

For the reasons Chris has outlined in his post below, a number of stories will go live on the blog retrospectively (they were written 'live' at the time but need to be appropriately reformatted i.e. with pictures etc, before they can be posted).

Here is our press release:

Two local Labour prospective Parliamentary candidates who were in America helping Barack Obama’s campaign have arrived back in the UK, hailing his ‘inspirational’ election victory.Chris Clark, Labour’s Parliamentary Spokesman for Ashford, and Dr Rav Seeruthun, Labour’s Parliamentary Spokesman for Maidstone and the Weald, arrived in the US two weeks before the election and were based in the key swing state of Florida.Chris and Rav took part in the Florida Democratic Party’s efforts to ‘get out the vote’, knocking on doors and speaking with voters in the Tampa area.The parliamentary candidates were guests of the Hillsborough Democratic Party and Susan Smith (centre of the picture attached).

They also met with one of the many lawyers working for the Democrats in Florida. They were astounded about how complicated the ballot was, in total it was over four sides of A4 paper. The received a really positive response from the American public. They were really interested in how an Obama win will have a positive effect on the world. Their main challenge was not to get caught up in long conversations and to get on with the job of winning votes!

Chris said: ‘This has been an amazing experience. I’ve worked on lots of election campaigns in the UK but this was something else, an inspirational, defining moment, and it’s been an honour and a privilege to be involved. Knocking on doors in Florida, I sensed real excitement, a feeling that people are desperate for change. And being at the reception in Tampa on Tuesday night with hundreds of volunteers, who’ve all worked so hard, was special.

‘The hopes of people around the world are invested in Barack Obama following this historic victory. From day one, he will have to take important and difficult decisions on the economy, on energy, on the environment and on foreign affairs. If there’s anyone who can meet that challenge and deliver the change we need, it’s Barack Obama.’

Rav said: ‘This is an event led by my generation doing something incredibly positive and I feel really proud of that. It’s been an absolute privilege to be part of history helping Barack Obama become the first black President of the United States. We have been doing everything we could to help this happen: we have knocked on doors in 90 degree heat, telephoned hundreds of voters and stood outside polling stations in the two hour queues for early voting encouraging people to support change.

'We were lucky enough to see Obama and Bill Clinton speak together in Orlando. It was amazing to see the make up of the crowd, all ages, all races, all chanting ‘yes we can’. Obama is an inspirational figure and the right man for the America and the world. I remember doing speeches about Martin Luther King at school, and never thought that in my lifetime this would happen.

'When we were out door knocking it was difficult to see that number of houses that had been foreclosed because of the credit crunch. Obama now has to prove himself and his first one hundred days will be key to this, he now has to ask what’s next?’

We Are The Champions

The final push is near. Tomorrow and Tuesday will be long, busy days. You can get through polling day on adrenaline (I’ve done it before and will do it again) but it helps if you’ve got some reserves of energy in the tank. So I had a good rest and didn’t get up too early.

When I did get up, it was to make sure I was in time to watch the Brazilian Grand Prix, the final race of the Formula One World Championship. And I’m delighted to report that after a nail-biting finish, we have our first British World Champion since Damon Hill took the title for Williams in 1996. Well done to McLaren and Lewis Hamilton. Lewis’s inspirational victory has set the tone for what I hope will be a historic week. By late Tuesday we could have the first black Formula One World Champion and the first black President of the USA, within three days.

Later in the day, I went over to the office on Bearss Avenue and was presented with a list of people to phone. This was a list of the phenomenal number of people who’ve attended an Obama event, joined a mailing list, given money to the campaign or otherwise shown that they are a strong supporter. My job was to phone and encourage them to give some time to the campaign – preferably as part of the formidable door-knocking machine. I spoke to two people who said they would come and help, and mostly left messages on answering machines. It’s always difficult to gauge how much of a difference these calls make – it’s not the most rewarding work if you’re mostly leaving messages, as I was, but on the other hand, if even a few of the people I’d left messages for rang back, saying they’d be coming down to help canvass tomorrow afternoon, then it would definitely have been worthwhile.

Wrapped Up In Books

As anticipated yesterday, I had no way of getting over to Brandon. Fortunately, John, an Obama campaign staffer working on data processing - who moved into Susan’s house ‘for a few days’ in June and has been there ever since! – was able to give me a lift to ‘Jimmie’.

Seeing as the Jimmie B Keel Public Library is not just a polling place but a public library (the clue’s in the name), lots of people walking towards the building are not there to vote but to return books or DVDs – this makes them quite easy to spot. However, ‘Mrs McCain’ (pictured above) doesn’t discriminate. Everyone who passes - even wearing an Obama T-shirt and walking away from the polls - is greeted with ‘Thank you for your vote for John McCain’. One of my favourite moments along these lines occurred this morning, when she approached a gentleman who was walking away from the library, carrying a book, and asked: ‘Would you like some literature?’ In response to this, he pointed to his book and said: ‘Already got some.’

We were a bit short at the polling station this morning as a few volunteers hadn’t turned up and others had been diverted to the Chris Rock event at Citrus Park. However, when a few more people arrived, Susan gave me a lift down the road to the Obama campaign office and I was teamed up with a young lady called Dana. She and her (ex-military) husband run an IT training business.

The round we were given was some way out of town and turned out to be more spread out than any I’ve done so far. We ended up effectively driving from house to house! This was also an area of contrasts, with estates consisting pretty much of mud roads and mobile homes just a street or two away from gated communities of huge mansions.

Many of these estates have drainage ponds – a necessity because the land is so flat and they need somewhere for rainwater to go. The downside of this is that in the hot weather, they dry up, leaving little pools of stagnant water – a breeding ground for mosquitoes. Annoyingly, I’ve picked up a few bites. Another thing I’ve noticed is that everyone here seems to have a dog – so far, no really aggressive ones though.

Just as we finished our round of canvassing (after which Dana was due to go ‘off duty’), Harry rang to ask where I was. We returned our canvass sheets to the office, where I met Harry and we went out to do some more canvassing. It's starting to get dark earlier and earlier, and we went off duty at about 17.30.

This was the last day of early voting. We’re hearing that 3 million people have voted early, and that of those more are Democrats than Republicans. Which is promising but doesn’t ‘seal the deal’ – three more days of hard work to go.