from Obama for America


DATE: October 31, 2008
TO: Interested Parties
FROM Craig Schirmer, Pennsylvania State Director, Obama Campaign
RE: Final Push

Halloween is here, and the McCain-Palin campaign is running scared.

As we enter the last 72 hours until Election Day, voters across the country are making it known that they want change - and want Barack Obama as the next President of the United States. In Republican strongholds from Indiana to Virginia to North Carolina, Barack Obama is running strong. In early voting states such as Florida and Ohio, people are lining up for hours in order to cast their ballot for an economy that works for them, affordable health care, and jobs that can't be
shipped overseas. The Obama campaign is now expanding the map to states such as North Dakota and even John McCain's home state of Arizona, supplementing the strong organizations already there with media buys.

In Pennsylvania, the Obama campaign also is expanding the map. We have 81 campaign offices across the state, many in parts of Pennsylvania that have never seen a Democratic presidential campaign set up there before. We have more than 500 staging locations for our grassroots canvass teams, positioned in every corner of the Commonwealth. And since June 1, our volunteers have knocked on 2.5 million doors and made 5 million personal calls to Pennsylvanians from Erie to Easton, from Pittsburgh to Plymouth Meeting.

That's what John McCain and Sarah Palin will face when they come to Pennsylvania these next three days. The Keystone State has always been a battleground - no Democratic presidential candidate has won more than 51 percent of the vote since 1964 - and the Obama campaign is ready for them. We have over 57,000 volunteers signed up to canvass and make phone calls over this weekend and on Election Day. We have filled nearly 180,000 volunteer-shifts for the final push, and as Election Day approaches and excitement builds, our organization is growing at an even quicker pace. Yesterday alone we scheduled over 20,000 GOTV volunteer-shifts. The visits of John McCain and Sarah Palin can't compete with this grassroots organization (remember that George W. Bush visited Pennsylvania 44 times in the 2004 campaign - compared to John Kerry's 24 - -and still lost the state).

The McCain campaign can try to scare Pennsylvanians with their robocalls, email smears, and false attacks. But this Halloween, Pennsylvanians fear something scarier: another four more years of the failed Bush-McCain economic policies. That's why they're rallying to Barack Obama and Joe Biden, signing up to volunteer, and are ready and motivated to win this state and change America.

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