Much has been written about the enormous volunteer army assembled on behalf of Barack Obama in swing states; this Los Angeles Times story about Ohio is only one example. But judging by the campaign's focus on making sure that my nineteen-year-old son Nick votes, the stories may actually understate the size and scope of the operation.
Nick is attending college at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., and getting Colorado officials to send him a ballot wasn't easy, as is documented in the October 29 blog "The Difficulty of Being a First-Time, Mail-In Colorado Voter." But Team Obama has been carefully tracking his efforts to weigh in. A couple of weeks ago, a pair of volunteers showed up at our home specifically asking if Nick planned to vote. Then, this past Saturday, another representative dropped by, inquiring about Nick by name. (I assured him that I'd personally dropped off Nick's ballot at a very busy early voting center on October 31.) And later that evening, during a phone conversation, Nick told us an Obama surrogate had called him on his cell phone earlier in the day to inquire about his all-important ballot. That's one way of letting a rookie of this process know how important his vote is. -- Michael Roberts
