I had Ace and Rascal with me, in a wagon, eating snacks.
Did you bring enough for everybody?
Maybe heebie doesn't want to provide adorable children for the entire neighborhood.
I would have expected sexism to work the other way and them to be less threatened by you.
In the years that I've done this, the child in tow seemed to give me some credibility, At least people seemed happy to see the baby. The thing that seemed to make the biggest difference was the income of the neighborhood. I didn't want that to be the case, but in this town at least, it became predictable. Folks in my own low income neighbourhood were much more inclined to scream and slam doors. The slightly better off neighborhoods, people approached politics as if they were rooting for a family sports team. (This is a huge generalization.) The middle-class neighborhoods, people began to be willing to discuss politics. This was frustrating, because I was very much wanting people in my neighbourhood to get excited about my candidate. I became aware pretty quickly too, that in my neighbourhood a lot of people were at home when I called because they were shift workers and I'd woken them up, or because they were suffering from a chronic pain condition. Someone who's comfortably retired or working professionally from home is going to have a different sort of reaction to someone at the door wanting to talk politics, perhaps.
Don't you have a facial piercing? I ask only because around here that would immediately identify me, were I to walk blocks, as the kind of block-walker not to be trusted.
"Why Do All These Body Modders Keep Walking My Block?"
6 - yes, lip. This is a pretty heavy body-modification town, though. We have a lot of the Jill Stein Libertarian-meets-conservative tattoo'd quasi-hippies in this town*, so piercings and tattoos don't code in a straightforward way. (*ie our big, annoying, successful movement to end fluoride-supplementation in the water.)
I don't really see many people with piercings, except ears, in my ordinary life. Every winter I forget that basically every woman under 40 has at least one tattoo.
Don't know if this applies to others, but I have essentially zero people knocking on my door who aren't (a) pre-arranged guest, (b) pre-arranged workmen of some sort, or (c) people soliciting for something or other. So I only go to the door in cases of (a) or (b).
This doesn't explain why your rate is different than the others, but it could contribute to the small sample size.
My wife I'd like that. She won't answer the door if she doesn't know you or isn't expecting you.
How many blocks could a body mod walk if a body mod could walk blocks?
It's not something you can get around by being totally not threatening because the logic in 10 is solid.
Maybe your best bet is hand out flyers when you trick or treat.
This sort of thing is why I prefer to just give money to campaigns.
14: that's nice. We haven't had a trick or treater in years.
Oh, when we knock on other people's doors? That could work.
This sort of thing is why I prefer to just give money to campaigns.
In this particular situation, I'm blockwalking in order to curry favor with the potential councilmember, and hopefully tip their loyalties towards the side of good, when developers come knocking with dollar bill signs.
18: Well, it's different for people like you in positions of power.
Just keep knocking on the same doors each week, explaining that you're back with another one of those block-walking beats.
The thought of knocking on strangers' doors to engage them in conversation about anything gives me the cold wobblies. I'd rather get beaten with a stick.
So apparently "cold wobblies" is also attested but come on, "cold robbies" is superior.
I went a-knocking with my state senate candidate a couple weekends ago. In Ronan (it's a big senate district). Mostly people weren't home, but several really seemed to enjoy the opportunity to talk to me. Women older than me.
They'd want to slag on Hillary, but I'd change the subject to Denise Juneau, and that got them back to thinking maybe they did want to vote after all.
Then a final pitch for my guy, and off down the block.
Fat old man walking aimlessly around in a small town, those women are doing me a good turn by talking to me.
32, 33: Yep, giving money looks better all the time.
The thought of knocking on strangers' doors to engage them in conversation about anything gives me the cold wobblies. I'd rather get beaten with a stick.
This. Plus I suspect it would be counterproductive. I was really in that position for the Brexit campaign. The nature of my pro-EU position is not exactly one that was likely to win over the other side (We should cede more sovereignty as part of a proper fiscal union! Freedom of movement is great! You do know you're just going to be subject to EU regulations anyway if you want to do business with Europe?) So either I have to not say that and instead spout talking points I don't believe in from a Tory government, or I say what I actually feel and alienate the very people I'm supposed to be persuading.
It's now too late for you, but your comment contains the start an obvious solution. If it is that easy to alienate the very people you are supposed to be persuading, just canvas for the other side.
I've done door to door canvassing in my youth a few times. I had to go and lie down in a darkened room afterwards. Eventually the organiser took pity on me and gave me a coordinating job at the base, while all the bright young extroverts did the knocking. In a well organised campaign there are a lot of things to do that don't involve talking to strangers other than your fellow volunteers.
It's only extremely local races (like what Heebie and I guess Carp are doing) that encourage block-walking where you're supposed to engage people and get into a political discussion with them. That's because most people are terrible at block-walking and basically no one is likely to be persuaded by a block-walker. Oh yay this random weirdo came to my door, now I have been persuaded by their excellent talking points!(the exception where block walking can help are local races where no onw has heard of the candidate and is at best vaguely aware of the office that is being run for, this is a reason why we should have many many fewer elections but that's a different subject). In a big race door-knocking is 100% about either (a) identifying people who you think will vote for your candidate and (b) getting them to show up on election day. That's it. Minimum interpersonal skills and charisma needed, though you need to be chipper and know when to shut up and move on.
I want to get somebody to move my polling place back to the school across the street from me. Apparently the school complained, I guess because I was the only one buying cupcakes from the PTA parents, and they moved half of the districts to another location. Now, I have to vote at a place that is further from my house than four or five other polling place and that I can't walk to.
39. I agree it's not very useful, but probably a lot better than a phone bank, which I find actively offensive. In Britain the point is less to persuade people than to work out who supports your candidate in advance and check if they need help getting to the polling station. Then on polling day, 1. you can provide such assistance where needed and 2. your observers can send back lists of people who have voted from time to time and you can check them against your list of supporters and go and gently chivy stragglers later in the day.
36: Negative canvassing would be such fun.
"Donald Trump specifically requested I come to your house and let you know that your lawn maintenance is for shit."
41 is certainly how it works here. If I don't vote in the morning, which I won't now that I can't vote at the school across the street, somebody will come knock on my door.
When can call Pbgh The Shire if you want. During the Saruman administration, presumably.
Minimum interpersonal skills and charisma needed, though you need to be chipper and know when to shut up and move on.
Failed on the first one and my instinct for the latter is "before ringing the bell". Talking to strangers is pretty much my least favourite thing.
In a big race door-knocking is 100% about either (a) identifying people who you think will vote for your candidate and (b) getting them to show up on election day. That's it. Minimum interpersonal skills and charisma needed, though you need to be chipper and know when to shut up and move on.
This is right, even here. Up here where the PM is elected via the election of local candidates there's a real possibility that people will not vote because they've never seen the local candidate. And there's always the chance they'll take a lawn sign. But it does feel weird going door-to-door.
I actually really like canvassing. There's a moment of mystery between ringing the doorbell and finding out who lurks within that I really enjoy.
That's the moment when you light the paper bag.
My city is heading toward electing a guy who was recently convicted of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. His success is largely to his skill at going door-to-door.
I thought minors were all about their cell phones.
52: oh god, with the creepy plantation-themed photoshoot, right? I'd forgotten about him.
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In the latest end-of-days news:
A Colombian peace deal that the president and the country's largest rebel group had signed just days before was defeated in a referendum on Sunday, leaving the fate of a 52-year war suddenly uncertain.Here's a no voter:
"If 'no' wins, we won't have peace, but at least we won't give the country away to the guerrillas. We need better negotiations."Right. When the rebels have negotiated on account of having totally lost the war. There're about 5000 of them left, rotting in the jungle. WTF.
55: the rebels did manage to get a pretty good deal for people who have totally lost the war. Guaranteed seats in the Senate!
Having senate seats basically reserved for people hostile to the very concepts behind our government hasn't hurt us yet. At least not irreparably.
We shall watch their careers with great interest.
Let's hope they can do better than "trusTED" signs.
10 seats out of 102 (or 112, if they add new ones). Significant, but not remotely enough for impunity. It's telling that the FARC still says it has no intention of fighting.
Turnout was low, with less than 38% of the electorate casting a vote.
This is what I don't get, here as everywhere.
55. The story I read about this said the reason it was defeated is that the deal wasn't harsh enough on FARC.
61. Most people assume that if an issue is being submitted for a referendum, the fix is already in.
I wasn't knocking on random doors, but trying to get our 1s and 2s better identified. A huge percentage of folks vote by mail, and once the ballots go out next week, we'll be encouraging folks to mail them in.
There's always a script.
Everyone I talked to knew (and disliked) the opponent -- a more local house member looking to move up to the senate -- but none knew my guy. So another thing is the signal that my guy cares about the northern part of the district. We have a popular guy running for that house district (and a crank in opposition -- but this year no one can discount cranks!) so we can hope to minimize ballot drop-off.
The Libertarian US House candidate was just killed in a car wreck. I don't know whether he'll still be on the ballot.
His booth was across the hall from ours at the county fair, and during my early afternoon shift, he just couldn't stay awake. Fairgoers would shush each other as the realized that the guy was sleeping sitting up.
Being a sovereign self-sufficient individual is really tiring.
62. This appears to be the case. Apparently the areas which have been centres of fighting were strongly YES, but areas that were less affected were more split, and the hard right, including the previous President, Uribe, wanted harsher terms, although they're now denying they want the war to continue.
NYT, here. Chris Bertram (Crooked Timber), who's in Colombia as an observer, says it's as good an analysis as any at this stage.
He ran often, for one thing and another, for 20 years. Missed the last debate on account of illness, but they had an empty podium on the stage. Just one of those bizarre little things when you look at US politics at the granular level.
When is someone in our worthless media going to ask a Trump surrogate exactly which parts of Trump's tax plan are designed to crack down on the abuses Trump knows so well, because he really knows the tax code?
Like Pat Paulsen, without the humor or the ability to stay to the right of the center line.
63: What bothers me is that all the polls called it wrong.
69.1: Apparently. But this implies it's more mixed:
In the eastern province of Casanare on the other hand, 71.1 % voted against the deal. It is an area where farmers and landowners have for years been extorted by the Farc and other illegal groups.
Apparently the areas which have been centres of fighting were strongly YES
There is presumably a fair amount of overlap with "areas with large numbers of FARC supporters and sympathisers".
Insofar as they have sympathizers. They started out lefty, but they've been very ugly for a very long time now. OTOH, they sell lots of cocaine, and some of that money has to trickle.
Not worthless: https://twitter.com/ThePlumLineGS/status/782946660792070147
Not going to get picked up by cable, though.
76: they're a guerrilla movement; they have sympathisers. You just can't be a guerrilla without support from at least some part of the population. "The revolutionary fighter moves in the population like a fish in water", remember?
A revolutionary movement can't move like an aquatic mammal through water because their tails are oriented vertically.
78. I think their increasing difficulty in moving in the population like a fish in water was part of what brought them top the negotiating table. Basically they were losing the war, badly. A well embedded guerrilla movement doesn't find itself in that position unless the population is systematically wiped out.
78: "Insofar as". I haven't been following, but AFAICR most of FARC is literally hiding in the jungles, living mostly off drug smuggling. In that situation the need for popular support is reduced. Also, 'support' has never been the same as 'sympathy'.
Most of FARC is dead or in prison. The point was to reintegrate a remnant.
Well, yes. Most of surviving FARC, I should have said.
A few more like Brexit and Colombia and I wonder if mandatory voting might get more attention.
I think it's probably best to leave untested the assumption that there is a silent, lazy majority that supports me in email but won't take the trouble to vote.
Data point: the Hungarian refugee referendum was voided by low turnout. Very likely most people here wouldn't have liked the result (98% of people who bothered voted to reject EU refugee quotas), but even Orban couldn't drag a quorum to the polling booths.
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Bleg, VOT due to voting: I've done a survey where everyone put possible items for discussion in their preferred rank order, and I need to pick 5 or 6 out of 17. Is there a standard way to calculate the optimal choices from this data? Options I've identified so far:
* The online survey tool automatically shows the averages of all the rank orders of each item, so something one person ranks #1 and three people rank #6 will get scored 4.75.
* Arithmetic scoring: 1 point to an item for getting picked #17, incrementing up to 17 points for getting 17 (or I could vary the increment), add it all up.
* Geometric scoring: 2 points for #17, 4 for #16, 8 for #15, etc. - or more likely vary the power raised to something creating less ridiculous numbers, like 1.1, so 33.2 points for getting #1), add up.
|>
All the cases we're complaining about are referenda. The Colombia case is probably unusual in that this is something that really does have to be resolved; in the other cases it's about moving away from the status quo. If you must have referenda, there should be super-majority and minimum turnout requirements.
Low turnout hurts elections of legislatures too, but in a more low-key way we're too used to.
88: Figure out what you want, then figure out calculation method that gets that results.
If you have ethics, then the answer is "No".
Referenda are the democracy of fools. Just say no.
Like why the fuck should there be a referendum on the FARC thing. Obvious terrible idea. (It might have been required to comply with the Columbian constitution, but a peace agreement that hinged on a referendum was an obvious shit plan).
93/94: This guy says referenda per se aren't bad, but referenda held after negotiations are:
Which last seems to be exactly what happened in Colombia.An early ratification process could safeguard the peace process from unavoidable reversals in public opinion, increase flexibility as to the timing of critical decisions and maximise the credibility of leaders aiming for a negotiated settlement.
De Klerk was able to negotiate a credible end to apartheid without fearing a risky referendum at the end of the process [because he held one before major negotiations began]. [...] by restricting any mandate for later renegotiation, the Annan Plan [in Cyprus] allowed propaganda to dominate on issues that could have very easily been clarified in any subsequent version.
Referenda are always bullshit at all stages of the process. Electorates everywhere are morons (if Brexit and the current US election haven't proven that I don't know what could) and while democracy has many virtues, especially the one of allowing people to throw bums out who have been bums, giving >any specific controversial policy proposal directly to voters is always a terrible idea. The last thing in the universe that should ever be submitted for referenda are the approval of treaties.
The only exception I'd make for allowing referenda is actually approving a state's original constitution, and even there only maybe.
The notorious rightward drift of the aging voter.
Republika Srpska just had a referendum to keep the anniversary of the day that the Bosnian Serb republic broke off from Bosnia as a national holiday regardless of what the Bosnian constitutional court says about respecting minorities. It passed with 99.8% of the votes.
Oh well, its not like Bosnian Serb nationalism ever caused any problems.
Tigre that article I linked is interesting and not long. The SA case especially is interesting. De Klerk definitely got maneuvering room he wouldn't have otherwise. OTOH most of the referenda mentioned there definitely didn't work. Also totally agree re treaties.
I wonder who the "DC_UKPM" in the comments is?
Irish constitutional amendments (except for the first few) have required referenda, and those have mostly turned out okay. I mean, there are a few whose results that I find awful (no abortion), but they're completely in line with what the population wanted at the time. Then again, they only require a simple majority--the 15th Amendment legalizing divorce (in 1996!) passed with 50.28%(!). And this probably means that things that should probably be statutory law become constitutional too easily.
96: I basically agree. Although there's nothing like living in California to give someone a massive bias against proposition/referendum type systems.*
*Grew up there and then lived there as an adult for 4 years.
Oh, and they did almost blow up the Treaty of Lisbon. And maybe the Treaty of Nice, too. Although having at least one referendum to cede power (presumably) permanently to a supra-national entity is somewhat akin to 96's exception for original constitutional law. But yah, referenda probably suck there, too.
We occasionally have them here in PA, and although not as awful as CA's they're mostly useless. Almost all of them were on complex technical issues that I didn't have any well-formed opinions on. The only exception was continuing the requirement that city police officers have to live in the city, which passed but might not actually be constitutional with state law. I mean, jeez, it'd be nice if all options in referenda are checked by all relevant high courts before you waste the electorate's time.
Don't let those judges get their filthy hands on your popular sovereignty, dal!
This reminds me about Nebraska's death penalty referendum coming up next month. AIMHMORTHB, the state legislature got rid of the death penalty, the governor vetoed it, and then the legislature overrode the veto. Which surprised the shit out of me. Anyway, the governor and others started the referendum process collecting signatures force a referendum. This was successful, which did not surprise me.
The South Africa article is interesting but I don't have time to read it in detail and South Africa is such a weird case.
If someone really wants to mess with Nebraska, they should start a referendum to reintroduce a bicameral legislature.
I don't see the problem with the unicameral.
Said the King to the Estates-General.
I don't see the problem with the unicameral.
Neither do I. I'm thinking purely in terms of the potential entertainment value of mobs of unicam and bicam partisans brawling in the streets. Brother against brother & etc.
The Nebraska Legislature should meet on the most sacred ground in Nebraska, the site of the college world series, when debating something as significant as the death penalty.
In Maryland, the legislature managed to hold the line on not bringing in casinos, so the gambling interests went the referendum route. Which is why slot machine profits from central Baltimore go to subsidize horse farms in the exurbs.
112: How can you say that about the state that has Carhenge?
Also, in the Republican county I used to live in, they passed a referendum to go from three at-large county council members to five elected by district. This allowed them to gerrymander the fuck out of the districts, so that the moderate Republicans from the county seat were outnumbered 4-1 by the Teahadists from the outer areas. And now council members only have to answer to their part of the county, which means the outer areas trade favors and the county seat gets jack.
113: Same story in Ohio. Maybe it all worked out by giving Dan Gilbert the extra spending money he needed to bring a worthy supporting crew for Lebron.
I knew if I googled "Robin F/cker referendum", I'd come up with something stupid. Wiki says he got one passed that "requires the nine-member Montgomery County Council to vote unanimously to raise property tax revenue above the local limit. The victory earned him the Libertarian Party's Free Market Hero of the week award."
I looked up "Libertarian Party Free Market Hero of the Week." Its a very prestigious award, apparently handed out by the Libertarian Party's blog. For all of three weeks in 2008.
in a well organised campaign there are a lot of things to do that don't involve talking to strangers other than your fellow volunteers
IME, there are way more people looking to do the other things than are needed so the pressure to walk or call is high.
That said, I'm moderately good at finagling other work for myself.
Also, everyone wants to volunteer to drive people to the polls but usually only a few people need rides.
Do they ask specifically for people who will drive chain smokers to the polls?
This sort of thing is why I prefer to just give money to campaigns.
Yeah, me too.
I've been doing some phonebanking for the HRC campaign, and next Saturday I'm going to PA to canvass; but I truly doubt my abilities to influence any voter whatsoever.
First, I am an introvert. Calling or knocking on the front door of a complete stranger not only does not come naturally to me, it feels deeply wrong, like an egregious violation of the social contract, or something.
Second, I myself hate being solicited for any cause, however worthy, whatsoever. If I'm not expecting you to show up, I won't answer the doorbell, I won't open the front door. And if I don't already recognize your number, I won't answer my phone. If it's important, I figure you'll leave a voicemail.
And yet, I now find myself telephoning perfect strangers out of the blue, and preparing to make an assault upon citizens' privacy by ringing their doorbells next Saturday.
That said, I went to PA in 2008 to canvass for Obama; and I believe I may have actually convinced an elderly and intransigent female Catholic to vote for Barack against her "pro-life" principles (or maybe she was just being nice to me?) after about 30 or 40 or so disheartening and dispiriting rejections and repudiations.
I believe I may the ability to target the niche market of "older" female voters who are Catholic, whose fathers, husbands, brothers, and maybe even sons, used to be union men who voted solid Democratic all the way down the ticket. But that's a vanishingly small and increasingly esoteric niche; and I fear I basically suck at canvassing.
I'll be a legal observer again, probably in WI. Trump campaign keeps threatening polling place challenges, so I may be on the front lines this time.
Belated thought: do have any kind of American flag accessory during your block-walking? Even a pin would be visible through a peephole.
So would a flag tattooed on your ass, if you moon the door.
122 -- My calling and door-knocking has pretty much never been about convincing anyone of anything beyond the needs to go out and vote for my candidate, whom they already support.
Except for the last 3 days I've been calling to remind people of the fundraiser I'm co-sponsoring for my friend running for state senate.
But anecdotally there's such a strong need for outreach to Hillary fence-sitters, and possibly for convincing people with any brain cells at all not to vote for Gary Johnson. You're not going to find those people on a list, though, are you?
We just got very politely phone banked.
127 Well, what did they do in 2014 or 2012? If they weren't interested in Democratic politics, then while reaching out to them might well not be hopeless, finding them is probably not that effective a use of someone's time.
Well and also absolutely the last thing the Clinton campaign wants is an army of random volunteers "reaching out" in "persuasive" phone calls to voters. If you want to influence fence sitters there's opportunity to do that amongst people one knows, but it's not really a volunteer-in-politics kind of thing. You're not signing up to be a salesperson.
If that was cryptic -- no campaign and especially not a national Presidential campaign benefits from politically-active ordinary volunteers trying en masse to "convince" fence-sitters or anyone else to vote for a particular candidate. Think about getting a phone call from some 19 year old halfwit anxious to talk to you about drones or whatever. That's what it would be. *At most* as a volunteer what you can do is nudge already-inclined but lazy voters to the polls. That's it. "Persuasion" is what the rest of the campaign does -- the TV ads, the speeches, the policy positions, the meetings with civic leaders, etc etc etc.
Although the most persuasive thing of all, of course, are dank memes.
OT: Can squirrels be racist? My former neighbors (who moved to Austin, which I hear is nice) were white and the squirrels didn't appear to mess with them at all. My new neighbor isn't and the squirrels have been covering her deck with leaves and twigs and such.
Can squirrels be racist?
And now I feel bad for noticing where the black squirrels live in Central Park.
After we moved to DC, I was cheerfully telling the boyfriend how much I liked seeing the black squirrels around simce they were so novel. I was kimd of going on and on as we walked into our building's lobby. He blanched and sort of elbowed me to get me to shut up. After we got in the door, he said it sounds like I was speaking in code to refer to racial diversity, or at least referring to "the black ones" in shorthand. He realized it right as we walked past our concierge, who was an older African American lady.
Did anyone watch the debate? A quote taken from Josh Marshall's site: "Senator, you've whipped out that Mexican thing again."
I watched it for a bit but it seemed like one of those things where both candidates were so robotically on-message that there wasn't much point. People on twitter are saying (1) Pence looked better/calmer/etc but (2) he basically didn't defend Donald Trump on anything.
Understandable. Most of what Trump says isn't really defensible.
I watched it!
This line actually made me do a lol:
Ronald Reagan said something really interesting about nuclear proliferation back in the 1980s: he said the problem with nuclear proliferation is that some fool or maniac could trigger a catastrophic event. And I think that's who Governor Pence's running mate is. Exactly who Ronald Reagan warned us of.
People are saying that Kaine fucked up by talking too much and not allowing Pence time to hang himself.
"Two old white guys interrupting each other." -- one of my local radio stations.
We're still a month out but I have to say I think Hillary's running a damn fine campaign. She's playing Trump like a violin and the VP debate was a really nice set up to drive a wedge between Trump and those who are uncomfortable with him but were still inclined to vote for the Republican nominee because Republican.
142 She's also running a really tight ship. Which means she's learned the right lessons from 2008. I find this both encouraging for the election as well as (a bit more tentatively) for what it hides for her administration.
Hides s/b bodes.
Fucking autocorrect thinks it knows better than me.
Meanwhile, Trump went to Nevada, made a big thing of telling people that they had to pronounce the name of their state the wrong way (as "Ne VAH Da," people who live there pronounce the a as in "vat") and then literally said, apparently seriously, "I had a friend who said it the wrong way. He was killed." And it's just day after day of similar stories.
This election is so far beyond the believable it makes life itself feel like it's not really happening.
142. Is it the case that Sanders pulled out of joint events because she patronised his base? Because if so, that is not good campaigning, it's stupid, avoidable and self-defeating.
The problem presumably was that she matronised his base.