Looking for a Way to Help

Yesterday’s report that the Presidential race is a dead heat once again fired me up to do something besides whine. After coffee yesterday, my friend Marjorie sent me some information about volunteering and I made the plunge today.

I keep wondering who these women are who are jumping ship to support McCain-Palin. I couldn’t recall having even one serious conversation with an intelligent person who is a McCain supporter. But in truth I probably do know some of them, maybe more than I think.

After a fantastic trip to see the gardens at the National Cathedral with the Temple Micah Lunch Bunch, as we were sitting at Café DeLuxe, one of my favorite restaurants, one of them spoke out. I had thought of the congregants of Temple Micah as invariably bleeding liberals. This woman said she had been a Democrat all her life, but in January when she looked at the Democratic possibilities, she went to work for McCain. She’s smart. She’s a lawyer. She cleverly refuted every point any of us could make to the point where I had to leave before I exploded in frustration.

I went directly from lunch to the Obama office in Arlington and asked what I could do to help. I would have done just about anything not to work the phone bank, but that was the job with my name on it today. So I called and called and called, getting about 1 in20 home. Of those I reached, their preference was equally split between Obama and McCain. Two hours of phoning was about all I could take. I’ll be back another day to do more of whatever they need most.

I will probably join Marjorie, who has been working for the Obama campaign for about a year, when she goes door-to-door in Chantilly, a Northern Virginia suburb.

I’m somewhat incredulous that people are not running as fast as possible from another 4 or 8 years of Republicans in office. A quick look at our economy, the price of gas, the continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the failing health care system would seem sufficient reason to vote for the Democrats.

As a retiree I have been liberated from the Hatch Act restrictions placed on Federal workers, and I plan to do everything in my power to campaign for the change that is so desperately needed in this country!