04 Nov 08 Will Rogers Said It Best

“I am not a member of any organized political party, I’m a Democrat.”
-Will Rogers

That could be the tagline to any number of stories about the Democratic party here in southwest Colorado. I generally prefer to be registered as an Independent or Unaligned voter, because half the time I agree with one party or the other and half the time I don’t agree with either of them. But when it looked like there was going to be a real choice between the two parties I signed up as a Democrat so I could help pick this year’s candidate.

Somewhere along the way I discovered that Colorado is a caucus state, which seemed like a good idea for a short time. You get to hang out and meet people and shoot the bull at the caucus party and that sounded like more fun than just checking off a box on a form. Then they announced when the caucus was going to be held and it didn’t sound so fun at all. The Democrats held their meetings on a Tuesday night in mid-winter when it was -10F outside and the roads were iced up bad. I live a good distance from town, so I stayed home. I was doubly glad I did when I heard what happened to the people who showed up. They had to sit there and listen to all sorts of heavy political propaganda for three hours before they were allowed to say they wanted Hillary or Obama and go home.

The main impact of the campaigns in this county has been the sign-stealing squadrons. Mostly they were made up of good Republican teenage cowboys. My first Obama sign lasted about 12 hours. Finally, I nailed one to the elm tree down at the road with so many nails that it’s going to take me an hour to take it down. Some of the Obama teenagers finally got up the courage to go out sign-stealing a couple days ago, and now there isn’t a McCain sign or an Obama sign left standing anywhere in the county. Not even at the Republican Headquarters, and I was real proud of those kids for that.

This morning I’ll be driving voters to the poll. I expect the process to be frustrating and screwed up, because it’s being run by some kid from Berkeley who talks a good game but seems to lack awareness that he’s swimming in a sea full of Republicans. The first time I met him he put on his best smile and insisted with lots of energy that we were going to turn Montezuma County blue. I looked at him for a second or two and asked “Are you high?” but he said that he wasn’t. Eventually he admitted that if we can get 45% of the farmers and cowboys to vote for Obama we’ll be doing real good.

He sent me to drive a lady to the early voting office at the county seat last week, but it turned out she was in a full-time nursing home and suffering from dementia. That boy from Berkeley really does have a silver tongue, he totally convinced her to vote for Obama. Sadly, she forgot all about it by the time I got there. I expect to be sent down more than a few dirt roads today to meet up with people who’ll say “I mailed in my ballot last week.” Some 70% of the people in this county have already handled voting, but maybe there’ll be one or two Democrats out there today who haven’t done it yet. I hope so, because otherwise I’ll be sitting half the day in the campaign office, eating pizza and getting fat.