After 25 years in the media, a one-time journalist takes a side. Being a foot soldier inside the Obama Campaign, he witnessed stereotypes blown to bits on the porches and the sidewalks of his own town.
(SALEM, Ore.) - After more than two decades covering the political landscape, including five governors, four presidents, and hundreds of house and senate races, I could finally sit and let the wave hit me.
There were no lights in my eyes, no microphone in hand, no producer in my ear, counting the seconds to the moment the camera would go hot. Instead, a new era in America was about to dawn and I was nothing but a quiet observer.
On this, the most historic of all election nights in my 48-year-old life, I stood shoulder to shoulder with The Throng and just let the high-voltage moment flood my soul.
For just a moment I missed corralling the victor of the night for my live-shot, or chasing the vanquished into the side door of the hotel kitchen. From Atiyeh to Kulongoski from Clinton to Gore I'd done my best to ask the right questions and keep a straight face despite my personal views. But not on this night. For those who had worked getting Obama elected, we were getting our country back.
For several weekends leading up to this historic moment, I had volunteered my time walking door to door with my Obama clipboard and a list of potential undecided voters. The lists compiled by the IT gurus were incredibly accurate and useful in boring down on the last holdouts in the closing weeks of the campaign.
The goal was to find those who were "leaning" one way or another and attempt some small engagement. I would return to headquarters in downtown Salem and another volunteer would enter my data within hours. The Obama machine, even in the estimation of die hard R's, was a thing to behold.
The day that I knew Obama could cinch it was the first Saturday in October where hundreds had shown up to simply walk the neighborhoods or work the phones in downtown Salem. They were a broad collection of old and young, black and white, and sporting everything from cowboy boots to skater shoes.
They had come, not only to support a movement started by a transformational candidate, but to repudiate an administration that in the minds of many was nothing short of criminal.
What gave me incredible confidence was the fact that those assembled in the Obama camp looked nothing like the Endless Glacier of White that greeted the Alaskan governor the night she spoke to the Republican National Convention. I remember thinking as Sarah Palin smacked her lips and stacked her creds against the "Community Organizer" that the sentiment may end up coming back to take a bite.
For the McCain-Palin camp that sported signs that said "service," targeting a man who donated his time as a community organizer proved to be something of a fatal miscalculation. So was failing to tell the truth about the Bridge to Nowhere.
Being a foot soldier inside the Obama Campaign meant having some of my own stereotypes blown to bits on the porches and the sidewalks of my town. The conversations included one with an older white gentleman sporting a Confederate flag in his window who was a staunch supporter of Obama, to the African-American thirty-something who was convinced that McCain was our only hope against the Muslim-extremist horde.
My questions were simple for those who called themselves conservative. "Was it conservative," I asked, "to run a 10 trillion dollar debt, and start a preemptive war with a country that had never been a threat?" That question was usually met with complaints about how Bush had turned out to be "anything but conservative."
As the night of a new American age turned to morning, and the evidence of a mandate rolled across the nation like thunder, I felt somewhat naked, no longer holding to the tools of the superficial trade that is television news. The cables, the wires and my close friend and photographer Gino were comforting in those final years inside the mainstream media.
But now it was just me, watching Barack, as he spoke to the masses.
All I could do the next day was talk with my daughter Katelyn by phone and relive the moment again, as she described sitting alone in her apartment after finishing classes at the University of Oregon. She told me she cried as a new American president gave words to the very thoughts we'd all been having the last 8 years. I had to admit I'd cried myself, not just because I was no longer a part of the election coverage, but because we were on the right side of history.
The second reaction we had was hope. Not that we thought that Obama could fix the shambles the country is in overnight, but in the anticipation that the long night of arrogance, lies and lawlessness might be over.
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NOTE: Emmy Award winning journalist Eric Mason, was a network affiliate reporter until 2005, and has been a contributor to The Discovery Network, the LA Times and the Oregonian since 1984. You can reach Eric at: eric@endlesssky.net
Just Another Foot SoldierSalem-News.com