Emails home from Iowa - AMY Grace

DECEMBER 30, 2007

Hello –
It’s very cold and “snow white” here in Iowa but the Hillary campaign is really hot.

After 5 hours of door-to-door precinct work this afternoon, I had to come back and take a very long hot shower to thaw out. Colleen & I were paired for the adventure and we were a great pair; her husband Mark was our driver since there’s a lot of distance between the houses we were visiting here. The campaign now is focused on GOTC: Get Out to Caucus so we went to HRC-identified homes to urge folks to caucus on Thursday and told them the details of where & when & how. The people we met were warm and gracious and friendly. Only one man told me that he would vote for HRC but he’s just not ready to vote for a woman. [I wondered quietly if he might be ready any time soon – Thursday, perhaps?]

“Team MD” has 30-40 people here, the largest contingent from other states, so we look good and consequently, our state leaders too. I’ve just come from a mock caucus at HQ; it was pretty raucous (aha, a raucous caucus!) and quite unlike anything we will ever see in MD. Each of us will be assigned to a caucus location for Thursday which will be great fun.

Des Moines and Cedar Rapids are where the action is. Our Cedar Rapids office is responsible for 105 precincts. The campaign is expecting a big turnout on Thursday with a large percentage of folks who have never caucused before so it’s going to be very challenging trying to work out all the kinks in advance so people don’t get discouraged by the process & leave. We all did some brain-storming this evening and stressed the importance of a pre-visit to the precinct sites before Thursday to trouble-shoot potential site problems. We have a LOT of older voters and lots of snow & ice – a bad combination that demands extra TLC and planning. Our office had personal contact with an impressive 1,000 voters today; Colleen and I went to about 50 households and will do the same tomorrow and Tuesday too, I suppose.

I’m feeling good about the campaign professionalism and the momentum but getting our people to caucus is absolutely the key to victory.

So that’s a quick campaign update to share with you. I feel very fortunate to be here. More news as things progress.

Love,
AMY (MOM/GRAMY)


DECEMBER 31, 2007

Hello Dear Ones,
Colleen, Mark & I have finished another 6 hours of door-to-door GOTC (Get Out to Caucus) organizing this afternoon in the snowy/icy/challenging streets & sidewalks of Cedar Rapids. Street work has its challenges; I finally broke down and got boot warmers. But it has its real rewards too: I love it when people are home and willing to talk to us. I’ve been wearing my pink Hillary shirt with her picture on the front (even though it now has spaghetti sauce on the front too – I always apologize); it’s a real conversation-opener as you can imagine; no one else has a shirt like it though I could sell a bunch.

The momentum of support by women here, of all ages, is gratifying to see; they see it as a chance to really “be part of history.” I love talking to them and sharing the emotion of that. Imagine the magic of hearing an 83 year-old woman say: “I never thought I’d see this in my lifetime.” It’s not all about the fact that Hillary is a woman: it’s about the fact the most intelligent, most passionate, most experienced, most inspirational, most ready-to-serve starting Day-1 is Hillary who just happens to be a woman. I personally feel as if so many goals that I have advocated for and passionately cared about for 30 years are finally realized. A woman’s place is in the House (yes, Congress was nice) but it’s time to be in the White House. Will Hillary be different in any way from the 40+ men who have preceded her? Who knows? I’m not that idealistic but I am very hopeful.

We’re leaving at 6:00 tonight to drive to Des Moines to be with Hill & Bill at a New Year’s Eve party. Tomorrow she will be here in Cedar Rapids. This is the fun/excitement part but know that the door-to-door has its fun & excitement too. Being real comes easily to Iowans, it seems, and it’s a good environment to share.

If I can’t be in the arms of my beloved partner to welcome the New Year, this is certainly the next-best place to be.

Wishing us all health and joy in 2008 (and victory for HRC) – YES to ALL! –

With love,
AMY (MOM, GRAMY)

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JANUARY 1, 2008

Hello all –
Last night was a long and late one. We drove to Des Moines (2 hours away) for a New Year’s Eve party with Bill & Hill & Chelsea. There were about 500 campaign worker people there all filled with energy & passion for this campaign and this candidate. We left the party for a late dinner and got back to Cedar Rapids about 2:30 am. It was the strangest New Year’s Eve I’ve ever spent to not be with my sweetheart and friends to welcome the new year.

Today started at 9:30 am where we got our assignments for the day. Colleen & Mark went back to Baltimore so I had a new partner, Katie McDermott, from Annapolis. We had a list of more than 80 households to visit and confirm their presence at the caucus on Thursday at 6:30 pm. Turnout for Hillary is crucial. This was a very ambitious assignment in exceedingly cold temperatures, slippery conditions (we each fell once), with houses apart from each other. We visited about 60 households and urged people to caucus, answered questions, arranged rides. We’re back at the hotel now, cold but ecstatic about what we accomplished and the great reception we got from most homes. It’s odd to see how many households are split with one person supporting HRC and the other person supporting someone else. Of course it’s usually the women who are the HRC supporters but we did talk to several households where the man was supporting HRC and the woman was “uncertain.” It’s hard to know what to say to a woman in those situations!

Hillary will be in Cedar Rapids tomorrow so I look forward to possibly being able to see her in a smaller setting (sure … right). Katie and I will probably either be back “on the trail” or possibly with an inside assignment working the phones during most of the day.

I’m off to a long, hot shower now and dinner with volunteers at the Democratic Irish Pub. That seems like a perfect place to hang out for the evening.

Don’t take any of the polls (which all show different endings) too seriously. I may be in an isolated bubble here but I truly sense a big turnout and a fantastic victory for HRC.

Much love,
AMY (MOM, GRAMY)
P.S. Temperature in Iowa this evening is 2 degrees – expected high tomorrow = 11 degrees. I can take it: I’m an Aquarian.


JANUARY 2, 2008

Hello Everyone –

Wow! Today was the most inspirational day yet. After our morning briefing and more caucus training, we were assigned to the local community college to set up for Hillary’s visit to her Cedar Rapids supporters. I took on the job of holding a “barn” sign (aka big sign) at the entrance to the college to show people driving in the way to go. It was lots of fun but unbelievably cold to stand and wave and point the way for 1.5 hours. My reward when I went inside was to get a seat in the small auditorium instead of needing to stand. Little things mean a lot these days.

Our candidate was so terrific that I had to choke back my tears of happiness. She is sharp, focused, funny, serious, confident, obviously competent, inspirational, intelligent, witty, with a full list of goals and ways to achieve them, and ready to start the job the moment she can get access to the oval office (or probably already in process.) She criticized Bush for his agenda of ruling based on fear and futility; always telling us what to fear, always pronouncing what we cannot do, never daring to do anything new other than waste billions of dollars and thousands of lives on war efforts, and so much more. I have not been this taken with a candidate’s skills for a long time. I don’t just support her candidacy; I don’t just feel that she is the right person at the right time; I don’t just want to have a woman in the White House at last --- I love this woman! There’s never been a candidate like this. I am so grateful to have a chance, in my small way, to help elect her.

The campaign asked us (staff & volunteers) to try to restrain ourselves from shaking her hand or posing for pictures so that the Iowans would have an improved chance. So we stayed back knowing there will be other opportunities another time.

After this great event we went back to the office and made phone calls to supporters we didn’t see on the door-to-door urging them to “stand with Hillary” tomorrow night. The motto is “Stand with Hillary for one night so that she can stand for us for every day of her presidency.”

I’ve been assigned to my precinct for tomorrow evening; I will be visiting it in advance; it’s a local school. We have a major effort underway to match drivers with people who want or need rides to our 105 precincts. The campaign staff seems very competent at organizing this great effort. I will have a car to transport people.

I’m still predicting a big win tomorrow. You will know the results before you go to bed tomorrow. I’ll make a few phone calls home if I know something sooner than the national media but I doubt I will – they are everywhere.

Dream of victory – I know I will be. It will be so sweet.

Much love,
AMY (MOM, GRAMY)

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JANUARY 3, 2008

My caucus site was an elementary school south of Cedar Rapids. In 2004 they had about 100 attendees at caucus; they were expecting 150 tonight. They had 248! There was hardly room to move in the gym but we had arrived early and set up the HRC area with lots of signs, 50 chairs and tables with refreshments. Some caucus goers were already there when we arrived at 5:00 though the doors did not officially open until 6:30.

The energy in the room was amazing. At 7:00 sharp the caucus started with announcements and verification of the total number of attendees. Since my precinct captain was legally blind I did a lot of running around and counting to assist him. After the first round of counting it was quite clear that only HRC, Obama and Edwards were viable candidates - each had at least 15% (37 people). Then we had 15 minutes to convince folks in non-viable groups to come over to our side. That's when things got especially raucous and fun. There was one lone young woman holding up a piece of notebook paper with the name Kuchinich written on it in ink. I spoke to her and thanked her for her participation and told her I thought Dennis was a great guy. She asked me then why more people didn't vote their conscience: I said I was. She came over to the HRC group later.

The final tally from our precinct was 100 for Obama, 76 for HRC and 64 for Edwards. That translated into 4 delegates for Obama, 3 for HRC and 2 for Edwards.

It’s awful and disappointing and painful to lose and I now fear for her success in the upcoming primaries. Worst statistic of all for me is that Obama won 35% of the women’s vote; Hillary won 30%. I don’t really understand the Obama phenomenon (maybe I don’t want to today), especially here in Iowa, but it’s fascinating and more than a little inspiring to think that he can actually convince our unforgiving racist populace to vote for a “black man” with a “Muslim” last name.

Alternatively Hillary and her vast network of resources will come up with a plan to re-group and re-define her candidacy. I know she will not go down quietly. Apparently her message and her brilliance and her vision and her 35 year resume of activism did not speak to this general public strongly enough. It’s really hard for me to think that the others had a better strategy and ran better campaigns than hers. I know it’s only Iowa and there are lots of primaries ahead; I just really wanted her to win here.

For myself and my involvement in Iowa - no regrets, not one. I’ve been hanging out with wonderful people, hard workers, devoted to an inspirational cause. Now I just want to come home and organize for HRC in Maryland.

Thanks for listening and caring too; I’ve enjoyed being able to share my adventure with you all.

Love,
AMY (MOM, GRAMY)