Why Obama Can Win (Part 2.)
I find incredibly fitting that forty years later before another critical California primary the last of the brothers Ted Kennedy and JFK’s daughter Caroline would endorse Obama. If you haven’t yet had the chance to watch Caroline Kennedy’s ad please do so, it should make any democrat proud.
And this time, it is not just a dream. This hope is real, young are turning out and voting in numbers never before seen. In Iowa voters 29 and under made up 22% of caucus goers the same percentage as those over 65 and 4 points higher than those 30-44. Young people were among the most likely to vote. So far as I know this has never happened before in any election at any level anywhere in my lifetime.
It’s not just young people either, Independents and more than a few moderate republicans are turning out in droves and changing their registration so they can support Obama. That is a winning recipe for November and for the chance to actually govern. Consistently I hear from independents, greens, republicans, and people who have never voted that Barack Obama is the one politician they like or the one democrat they could support.
Recently I was in Reno canvassing for the Nevada caucuses. I was in charge of making sure people in a 6 block by 6 block neighborhood went and spent 2 hours in a local library for Obama. I went and knocked on doors in the snow, talked to people in the street and left door hangers in the dark. There were 316 registered democrats in the precinct and they expected 40 to show up. 181 people caucuses there, more than half of them under 25. For many of them it was the first time the voted in their lives and a quarter were independents and republicans who changed their registration to caucus for Obama. The caucuses started 20 minutes late because so many of them (more than half) needed to register.
This is how we win in November, Obama has shown an incredible ability to win among voters and in areas democrats do not normally compete in. He can build up the party and the country instead of tearing down the other side. He uniquely understands this moment in America and the lessons of the our past. I hope all of you will join me in voting for him this Tuesday