In an era of high-tech Internet fundraising and instantaneous e-mail blasts to millions of supporters, campaigning for the 2004 presidential election may boil down to old-fashioned, grass-roots, get-out-the-vote politics.
Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry began the week in Des Moines, his first trip to the Hawkeye State since he won the Iowa Caucuses three months ago. Kerry spoke to an energetic crowd of more than 1,000 at Veterans Memorial Auditorium, but more important he reunited with caucus veterans who helped him jumpstart his candidacy with a victory over then-front-runner Howard Dean.
Dean had the support of popular Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, and former Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley Braun withdrew just before the caucuses to endorse the former Vermont governor.
The caucus victory gave Kerry momentum to break from the pack in Wisconsin.
Kerry's return to Iowa Sunday was reminiscent of January's primary stump when average citizens had a good shot at engaging the candidate in one-on-one conversation.
Even with the general election campaign in full swing, Iowa is a place where people talk politics friend-to-friend and neighbor-to-neighbor. Friends gather to talk politics at a favorite diner or the neighborhood coffee shop.
"I will always say, 'Come to Iowa and watch them do their work because you know how to make it happen,'" Kerry told supporters. "Iowa sent a lesson to those who believe in the conventional wisdom. Iowa answered the questions of the cynics. Iowa proved that democracy at the grass roots is real."
His campaign had hoped for a larger crowd to hear a message on the economy, taxes, healthcare, education and U.S. foreign policy. But if Kerry is to win Iowa again in November, the personal touch may be more important than grandiose, presidential-like gestures for national consumption.
In his 25-minute speech, Kerry identified by name Iowans beset by economic problems.
Despite 19 years in the Senate, the Massachusetts Democrat is still introducing himself to a divided and polarized electorate. After a withering two-month, $45 million Republican negative-ad attack branding him a "flip-flopper" on issues, Kerry, 60, must waste no time defining himself.
The campaign is running targeted ads in Wisconsin, New York, New Jersey, Washington state, Oregon and California highlighting Kerry's positions on abortion rights, the economy, tax cuts, jobs and the environment. The spots urge supporters to log on to his Web site and contribute, but the campaign also wants to recruit volunteers.
Campaign strategists from both parties reportedly have narrowed the campaign down to 17 or 18 battleground states where every vote could count: Potential swing states include Iowa, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin. A Washington Post/ABC News poll conducted April 15-18 showed Bush leading Kerry 47 percent to 42 percent, with 7 percent for Ralph Nader. The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
Nader received just under 4 percent of the 2000 vote in Wisconsin, where Al Gore won by just 5,708 votes, but pundits don't expect the Nader factor to have anywhere near the impact of four years ago. Nader, 70, is trying to get on the ballot in Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Texas, Oklahoma and North Carolina by June.
GOP pollster Ed Goeas and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake found the pool of undecided voters in 2004 may be as small as it was at the end of the divisive 2000 race.
Kerry's schedule this week takes him to West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan. Bush has scheduled appearances in Minnesota, Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin and Ohio over the next couple of weeks.
The president Monday spoke to a community college convention about jobs and job training at the Minneapolis Convention Center and attended a private fundraiser at the home of a supporter in Edina, Minn.
About 160 people have signed up to host "parties for the president" in Minnesota Thursday night to drum up grass-roots excitement, a campaign spokesman told the St. Paul Pioneer Press.
Some 16,000 Bush backers are recruiting volunteers to stuff envelopes and make phone calls from telephone banks around the state. Supporters will raise their visibility when they start passing out literature door to door next month.
The days of whistle-stops are gone, but Midwesterners will see a summer of get-out-the-vote rallies, parades, picnics, civic club meetings and community events that could evoke the campaigns of an Eisenhower or Kennedy in a return to nuts-and-bolts campaigning.
John F. Kennedy and then Vice President Richard Nixon faced off in the first televised presidential campaign debate in 1960 before the fledging medium grew to dominate national campaign strategy.
Politics in the heartland remains local. Voters are exposed to a lot of television ads, "but one of the things we're found to be the most effective way to touch people is with friends and neighbors," Bush National Campaign Political Director Terry Nelson told the Pioneer Press. "Personal contact has a tremendous impact on voters. We know that it can be more significant than paid forms of contact."
The Kerry campaign agrees. For all the sophisticated polling and targeted mailings and media, the deciding votes in the election could swing on person-to-person contact.
"A co-worker, a neighbor, a classmate -- those are the best surrogates," said Kerry campaign spokesman Bill Burton. Kerry's team plans to send in paid campaign staffers to Minnesota next month.
Political analysts credit Minnesota's late Sen. Paul Wellstone, who died in a plane crash in October 2002, with proving that a well-run, grass-roots campaign still works. The populist Wellstone won over better-financed, better-known opponents in 1990 and 1996.
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