A graph shows the latest voters' distribution - Photo courtesy of Statista
By ALFREDO P HERNANDEZ
ORGANIZATION had prevailed over big money.
But it was more out of fear about what might happen under a
Republican regime than the supporters’ passion for Barack Obama that made many
Americans spirited campaign workers to get the incumbent president re-elected.
This was how Parker Borg, former US Ambassador to Mali and
Iceland, analysed the just-concluded election where Barack Obama has been re-elected
president of the United States after fiercely fighting campaign dollar-awash
Mitt Romney.
Writing exclusively for MWBuzz Borg said: The key to the
Obama victory and the defeat of the big money was probably the sophisticated
"ground game", where his wife Anna and he and thousands of other
volunteers-participated in Virginia.
US President Barack Obama (left) sits with campaign
volunteer Suzanne Stern as he makes calls from a campaign office in
Williamsburg, Virginia. –
Websitepic
He wrote his impression on the US election upon MWBuzz’s
request (see Borg’s full article in this edition).
Borg, who was among the first batch of Peace Corps
Volunteers sent to the Philippines by President Kennedy in 1961 and assigned to
Jose Panganiban Elementary School and JP High School, had campaign hard in
Virginia for Obama in 2008 when he first run for the White House and in the
just concluded presidential election where he sought re-election.
He said the Obama campaign machinery for this year’s
election had lacked the enthusiasm it had in 2008.
Borg had observed that at the beginning of the election
cycle, “it was apparent that the President's core supporters lacked their 2008
enthusiasm, largely because of disappointments over his record”.
On the other hand, the Republicans were highly motivated to
toss Obama out of office so they might pursue their traditional conservative
agenda, according to Borg.
“Although we (he and
wife Anna) both liked Obama and believed he'd made the best of a bad situation,
it was more out of fear about what might happen under a Republican
Administration than our passion for Obama that made us part-time campaign
workers in our home state of Virginia where we've lived off and on these past
twenty years.”
Borg said Obama’s campaign had been one of the most
organized movements in a US election where no stone had been left unturned --
one factor that made him won the 2008 presidential election.
Campaign volunteers pass out signs before a rally with
President Barack Obama on the campus of the College of Southern Nevada in North
Las Vegas. – Picture courtesy of GettyImages
He said that the campaign has zeroed in on one most
important item in their day-to-day work to generate interest among potential
voters and turn them into votes for the Democratic candidate.
Borg said that “quite skillfully, the Democratic Party had
determined the names and addresses of vast numbers of likely supporters who
might not be regular voters.
“They found phone
numbers and mapped out the streets where these people lived.”
Borg said that he himself had made several phone calls on
listed numbers from the Obama-Biden campaign office in Virginia trying to find
out whether the one answering was a Democrat and to convince him/her to go out
on election day and vote.
“On the weekend
before the election, we went to an Obama/Biden election office where we
received maps and packets of 60-75 names and addresses so that we might go
door-to-door every day from Saturday until Election Day to talk with people,
remind them to vote, tell them the location of their precinct, and offer them
rides to the polls if necessary.
“Hundreds of others
were doing exactly the same thing in neighboring communities. Likewise, other
volunteers contacted people from phone banks with the same messages.
“These volunteer
activities were coordinated from all of 71 separate Obama offices in Virginia,
each with a big sign saying "Obama/Biden" above the door with a dozen
or so volunteers on the inside answering questions and coordinating voter
outreach.
Borg said that in tracking campaign appearances by the
candidates and funding on advertising, it's important to note that many of the
most important states receive almost no attention because they are reliably
Democratic (like New York, California, Illinois, and Massachusetts) or reliably
Republican (like Texas, Georgia, Utah, and Wyoming).
He recalled that in the final weeks of the campaign, neither
Obama nor Romney held rallies in these states or any of the big metropolitan
areas of New York, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago, Atlanta or Houston.
“The rallies all took
place in cities and small towns of the battleground states.”
All the advertising attention was focused on these areas,
Borg said.
Looking at an electoral map after the election, one can see
that Obama won most of the states in the northeastern quarter of the country
and in the western coastal areas.
He said that the electoral map would show that Obama won
most states in the northeastern quarter of the US and in the western coastal
areas that included California, where a big concentration of Filipino-Americans
is concentrated.
Borg has observed that the challenger won most of the states
in the southeast and western plains and mountains.
However, this is simplistic, but it's the way things work in
winner-take-all elections, he said.
A closer look of each state would reveal that the Democrats
generally won the urban areas and the close-in suburbs in almost every state.
The Republicans won in outer suburbs and rural areas, Borg
said.
A second way to look at the election results is to see which
demographic group was voting for each candidate, Borg said.
Early figures showed that while Romney won the plurality
votes among males (52%), whites (59%), and evangelical protestant (perhaps
70%), Obama won among women (55%), Blacks (93%), Hispanics (71%), Asians (73%)
people under 44 years of age (60% under 30 and 52% under 44), and with incomes
below US$50,000 per year.
Borg said: “The Catholic vote was split in half, which was
surprising because of the strong role of the Catholic Church is support of
conservative social issues.”
“White males,” he
said, “strongly voted in his favor, particularly older and wealthy ones.”
Borg said that because of a Supreme Court ruling that
permitted unlimited contributions to Political Action Committees (PACs) without
identifying contributors, vast amounts of money flowed from some of these rich
white guys into the conservative's campaign in a desperate effort to defeat the
President.
“President Obama also
had a big campaign chest of funds, but these came more heavily from smaller
donors,” he concluded.
(Parker Borg was the US Ambassador to Mali (1981-1984) and
US Ambassador to Iceland (1993-1996))
For comment, email the writer: ahernandez@thenational.com.pg
and alfredophernandez@y7mail.com
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