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Now that you have voted, you may mark it down to my credit that I didn't try to influence your vote. The Obama campaign represents a fine example of volunteerism, I must admit. As you scan this account, substitute in your mind the Obama campaign efforts with the idea of mobilizing persons to voluntarily spread the Gospel of Jesus.
quote:Across the country, kids are preparing to pack suitcases with swimsuits, sunscreen and bug spray as they look forward to a week or two at summer camp. But none of that stuff will be needed at one camp already under way in Chicago.
This camp has no campfire sing-alongs, no marshmallow roasts, no knotty-walled log cabins to sleep in. Instead, campers spend their days inside a drab office building, with walls adorned with maps of the all-important early primary and caucus states, including Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.
Welcome to Camp Obama. It's a camp for adults — mostly young adults and college students — who are hoping to hone their political skills and learn the basics of organizing for a certain barnstorming presidential candidate.
"Barack Obama is inspiring a new generation of people to come in, and a lot of people have not been involved in the political process before," says Hans Riemer, national youth vote director for the Obama campaign. "We are training them, teaching them how to be effective, showing them what their role is in our strategy to win the election ... We're taking people from raw enthusiasm to capable organizers."
All campaigns rely heavily on volunteers to carry the candidate's message and do much of the campaign grunt work. And all campaigns spend a significant amount of time and money training volunteers to be more effective. But Riemer says the Obama campaign is trying something different in order to capitalize on the huge number of young people expressing an interest in the Illinois Democratic senator's run for the White House, a demographic that Reimer says campaigns usually ignore or view as unreliable on Election Day...
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