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Sep

19

RJC’s “message test” on Jews heavily debated by Dems, GOP

Filed Under Barack Obama, Campaigning, Ethics, Jewish, John McCain, Ohio, Politics, Poll, Voting, WH2008 | Comments Off

This post updates this post I wrote earlier this week about the allegations that someone/some group has been conducting push polls of voters who are Jewish.  Although Dems and GOP pollsters agree that the poll sponsored by the Republican Jewish Coalition was not a push poll intended to spread negative imagery and ideas about Barack Obama, the debate about its acceptability continues.

An excerpt from a lengthy JTA article:

Democratic pollster Mark Mellman, who was John Kerry’s pollster during the 2004 presidential campaign, said the lengthy list of questions appears to indicate that the survey was designed to test messages and “did not meet the definition of a push poll,” which usually lasts for a much shorter time than a regular survey, since the point is to spread the negative message to as many people as possible.

While clearing the RJC of the push poll claim, Mellman said it appears the organization was testing messages that wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny — and that he wouldn’t test as a pollster.

“There’s a line between basically accurate and basically deceptive,” Mellman said, “and they crossed that line.”

“I test messages, he’s testing lies,” said the executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council, Ira Forman.

He said that many of the questions that those polled say they were asked started with a “grain of truth” but omitted important context or twisted the meaning of certain facts. Forman said he would not detail the types of messages he tests.

Read the rest for the back and forth.  I’d say that if Mellman says he wouldn’t do it, that’s a pretty good sign of how close it was to a push poll.  On the other hand, that’s Mark Mellman – so – I don’t know – do some folks think he would do it, or has in the past? I am not that familiar with his history though I know he is very well-known.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 2:23 pm September 19th, 2008 in Barack Obama, Campaigning, Ethics, Jewish, John McCain, Ohio, Politics, Poll, Voting, WH2008 | Comments Off 

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Sep

19

What presidential campaign volunteers see, hear

Filed Under Barack Obama, Campaigning, Cleveland+, Elections, Ohio, Voting, WH2008 | 4 Comments

This post by Tim Russo at Blogger Interrupted is a very nice account of what one Obama volunteer in NE Ohio has encountered.  The photos and the narrative show and tell what people from the outside looking in should see and hear.  Wouldn’t it look even better side by side with more such coverage from all over the state? It would be nice to start a site that has a montage of such volunteer input.

Here is my account of the couple of hours I spent two days ago in the Obama Shaker Square office making phone calls:

First, the coordinator for Pepper Pike was persistent in calling me and scheduling me.  As I was telling someone yesterday, I’m at the three times is a charm stage of busy right now – if you don’t get to me at least three times, you may not get to me at all.  That’s just how it is right now.

So, it was also a good thing that he called the morning of the day I was to phone bank because I had entered it into my calendar but only as “OB” which of course could be for tampons, but it was scheduled at a certain time on my datebook, not on my to do list.  I’d commented that morning to myself that I had no clue what OB at 1pm was.  And I was going to delete it until the Obama person called to remind me.  I laughed – he didn’t. Read more

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:52 am September 19th, 2008 in Barack Obama, Campaigning, Cleveland+, Elections, Ohio, Voting, WH2008 | 4 Comments 

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Sep

19

Reason #47 to VOTE FOR Obama/Biden

Filed Under 57ReasonsObamaBiden, Barack Obama, Social Issues, WH2008 | 5 Comments

Because an Obama/Biden administration embraces the unrepresented and underrepresented.

This reason derives from my experience at the Obama Shaker Square office two days ago and how, when I was talking with undecided voters, I would describe why I support Barack Obama.  It really is as simple as that one line I wrote above.

How do I know that this is true?

Obama went into public interest law after being at Harvard. Yes, he worked on a book about race relations and he did become affiliated with and of counsel to a small firm in Chicago.  But, imagining what the job choices for the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review might have been, the choices he did make impress me unlike most options other law school graduates choose because I champion public interest law and have always been a devotee.  I was the one who constantly challenged my law school classmates, including close friends, who would say, I can’t afford to go into public interest law when the fact is, who can really afford it?, and I’d try to get them to re-consider their options.  People who have a certain order of priorities go into public interest law – and that order doesn’t look like the one for people who choose your more typical firm jobs (even though yes, people who go into public interest law have the same debt as the ones who go into the big firms).

This sense of commitment needed to enter public interest law is not as tangible as pointing to an Energy Policy, or an Environmental Policy, or Foreign Policy.  But it’s based on seeing how all these policies feel derived from the same general priorities for all policies: making sure that every group of people – whether they have a vote or not – are taken into consideration when devising policy.

I know what it takes to go into public interest law – the pushback against classmates, parents and other relatives, and even employers and eventual colleagues, and the sacrifice – because I went through it.  And to go through it, out of choice, says a lot to me about the caring nature of an individual. I see the Obama and Joe Biden campaign as an embodiment of that nature.

On November 4, vote for Obama/Biden.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:03 am September 19th, 2008 in 57ReasonsObamaBiden, Barack Obama, Social Issues, WH2008 | 5 Comments 

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