Pennsylvania says "You're Hired!" to Hillary Clinton

At the Clinton Rally the night before the election, Hillary Clinton told a crowd of 8,000 at Univ of Penn that this was the "longest job interview" anyone has seen. But that was okay because it's for the "hardest job in the world". To paraphrase, she said "If you're still undecided - when you go to cast your vote tomorrow think of this as a job interview and that you are hiring the person that you believe is the most qualified, most experienced and knowledgeable to handle all the problems that we will face in the coming years.  And if you believe that I'm the best person for the job and you offer it to me - well - I accept!"

And Pennsylvania spoke loud and clear - they want experience, they want a leader, they want a person that can handle the pressures of the job. Hillary Clinton has certainly displayed the leadership and qualifications to do this.

I arrived in Philadelphia in the wee hours of Saturday morning, due to flight delays. After a few hours of sleep at a nearby airport hotel, I picked up my two compadres, Ann & Chris, from San Diego and we headed up to Norristown where the San Diego Hillary contingency had been assisgned.

There, we ran into Vicki and Pat - two other supporters from San Diego and we were given the assignment to begin canvassing on behalf of Hillary "right away". I was a little nervous about this task since I had never really done this before - suddenly phone banking was looking a lot more exciting to me. But, we met a very nice woman, Jeannie, from the area who had been doing this and so the 4 of us (Jeannie, Ann, Chris and I) took off in her car and begin the task of going door-to-door in search of votes for Hillary Clinton.

It was a hot humid day - in the high 80's and the sweat was pouring off of us.  But, as we made our rounds through Montgomery County, we met many very friendly people.  I should note that we only went to homes of registered Democrats and it was our mission to find out if they were supporting Hillary or Barack, or if they were leaning one way or the other, or undecided.

To our surprise, there were still many undecideds, but the majority of homes we hit were supporting Hillary.  We did not challenge Obama supporters, we simply thanked them and left - but, when we had the opportunity to speak about Hillary to those undecideds or leaning Obama, we each had our own way of convincing people that Hillary was the best candidate for the job.

As the day went on, the task became easier.  Towards the end of the day, we were beginning to hit homes in a Jewish neighborhood and realized that it was Passover.  One home, the family was very friendly - the woman supported Hillary, but her two sons were Ron Paul supporters, they invited us for the Seder and offered us beverages to cool down.

That evening, we were exhausted - but our group had a great dinner at the King of Prussia Mall before checking into our hotel and crashing for the evening.

On Sunday, we met Jeannie in the morning and hit a new area of Montgomery County for a few hours.  Then, back at the Norristown office, we stopped to see Chelsea Clinton who came by to rally the troops and go canvassing herself. Here is a video of the office & Chelsea's visit, click here.

Jeannie had to meet a bus load of supporters coming in from Conn. So Ann, Chris and I went back out and canvassed on our own.

Over the next few days, the three of us canvassed Montgomery County in areas near Bucks County, Montgomeryville and near Norristown. Some of these areas were more rural, some were more upscale, and some were more working class.

In my opinion, it became clear that if rural Pennsylvania is anything like the rest of the country, then Barack Obama will have a difficult time winning a general election. This is not to say that we didn't meet Obama supporters - we did, but there were far less of them than there were Clinton supporters. Some people raised concerns about an Obama Presidency.  It's not the lack of experience, but the lack of knowledge about who he is, "where did he come from?" one woman asked me. "Who is he?" was a common theme among some cynical voters, while some were not thrilled about the thought of 8 more years of Clintons (mainly due to past scandals), they seemed far more ready and willing to have that then someone they really didn't know.  Another woman, kept referring to him as "Bahama" and did not like the whole issue surrounding Rev Wright.

Over the four days we were there, we estimated we went to about 500 houses during our canvassing efforts. Of course most people were not home, but even though there were some people that did not want to talk to us, most people were pretty friendly. I enjoyed discussing why I support Hillary Clinton for President. One Obama supporter asked me "Why would you support Clinton?" insinuating that it was more of the same. I told him it wasn't more of the same Hillary is not Bill.  I think she has the experience to get Universal Healthcare. He was skeptical that we weren't going to see Universal Healthcare, I told him at least Hillary will try. She has a history with healthcare, Obama doesn't. I pointed out that Obama supported the Bush/Cheney energy bill which gave tax cuts to oil companies, Hillary didn't. Also, most people remember how prosperous the 90's were. He said he thought Obama could unite the country. I said "how?" If he can't unite the party, how can he unite the country? I'm not sure he changed his mind.

But, there were many people we spoke with that really struggled with who to vote for. In the end, I used "guilt". "I flew all the way from California to ask for your vote! That's how much I believe in Hillary Clinton!".  People seemed genuinely surprised that my friends and I flew across the country to support Hillary.

I also appealed to women by saying "if you're still undecided by the time you get into the voting booth, could you at least vote for Hillary because she's a woman? Do it for all the other women, please." Wouldn't it be nice to finally have a woman as a President? Someone that will put women's issues like equal pay, women's health, child care, caring for elderly parents, teen pregnancies, pre-K education - these types of things at the forefront? For some women, they seemed to connect to this.

Much has been made of the new voters that Obama has brought into the democratic process - young people that have not shown this much interest in politics before. I admit, most of the homes we went to were not young people, rather people in their mid-30's on up. But, I was quite impressed by the number of women I met who were former Republicans but had switched parties simply to vote for Hillary Clinton. I also met a number of younger, single mothers and women who had never voted before, but registered for the first time to vote for Hillary Clinton. The media does not bring attention to this, instead they focus on Obama's popularity with younger votes and that is a shame.

On Monday, the day before the election, we attended the Clinton Rally in downtown Philadelphia at the Palestra Center, Univ of Penn. The place was wild with excitement, both on the streets and inside. The energy was enthusiastic and the crowd was pumped up. Stephanie Tubbs-Johnson, from Ohio, spoke first - she was great and charged up. Then, Mayor Nutter from Philly spoke, followed by Gov. Rendell and then Chelsea Clinton. She talked about how her mother will be a better President than her father because she is "more progressive and better prepared". She knows what it takes to run the white house.

Bill Clinton spoke and the crowd went wild. He talked about the importance of having a Commander in Chief that understands the complexities of the economy and the world. He mentioned that Hillary was running late, so he needed to keep talking until she got there. "When I'm forced to ad-lib, it usually winds up in the news the next day!".

With that - Hillary showed up with all the energy, bounce and zeal of someone that looked like they were about to win!!

The crowd went wild - watch my videos by clicking here,  here, and here.

Hillary's speeches have gotten better - she connects with the crowd even more effectively than when I saw her in San Diego. She gets to the point and she knows how to get the crowd worked up and responsive. Whether she's talking about gas prices, jobs, the cost of education or healthcare - she hones in on personal stories and facts that relate to people in their every day lives. My personal favorite line that she said was "America and the World will breathe a sigh of relief when that moving van pulls into the back of the white house and takes them back to Texas!". The crowd stomped their feet!!

It must have been nearly midnight by the time we left, Hillary was still there surrounded by the crowd signing autographs along with Bill. We must have said at least a dozen times "how does she do it?". We were exhausted from our day of canvassing, but this 60-year old woman has the energy of a 20 year old and she always looks refreshed and renewed!!

On the day of the election, we were suppose to be at a visability rally in Conshohocken by 7am!!! I admit, I slept in before packing up at the hotel. Ann, Chris and I grabbed some fast food and headed down there as fast as our tired bodies would allow us. After parking, we saw the group of Hillary supporters, grabbed our signs and joined them. We had no clue where we were (in relation to anywhere else), but it was a cute town and the fire station we were standing in front of was also a polling place.  There were alot of media trucks everywhere and I heard someone say "she should be here any minute." Who was coming, I asked - "Hillary". Wow!!! I had no idea!!! This was gonna be GREAT.

Before Hillary got there, a woman came up to us and started asking us questions. We later found out that she is Gail Sheehy of Vanity Fair, and an author of the book "Passages" and "Hillary's Choice", click here to read more about her. We told her how we traveled from CA to come here and support Hillary. She asked if we would support Obama if he wins. I told her I wouldn't and she was surprised to hear this. She had heard that some of Hillary's supporters weren't going to support him and wanted to understand the motivation behind that thinking. I said, for me, it was because I have been doing this for 14 months, like Hillary, and if she isn't the nominee I will be bitter and angry. It's her time and it's her turn. Obama could have waited, he's young enough and could have run later. She asked if I was angry at Obama and I told her I was more angry at the media and the DNC. I thought the DNC had a supid way of picking a President. How stupid is it that Hillary can win Texas by 100,000 votes, but lose in the delegate count?

She mentioned that Obama was a "movement", I told her I see him more as a Brand - a great media marketing blitz.

My conversation with her was cut short because Hillary suddenly showed up!! I must say, this was the highlight of the trip because Hillary came right up to us and talked to everyone. The photos and video I have of her at this event are fantastic. Watch here and here.  I added a page on my website to showcase more photos and videos, right here.

Hillary was so friendly, approachable and engaging. It was fun to see her in this setting, talk to her and get our pictures taken with her.  When she was done working the crowd, she went to a local diner and ordered a Philly Cheesesteak with extra onions to go.

After our morning with Hillary, we hit a few more homes found more and more that were voting for her. I think those undecideds began to break for her.

By early evening, we checked into our downtown Philly hotel, no sooner had we grabbed a bite to eat and CNN called the race for Hillary!!! OMG!! That was quick!! We thought it might go all night since the pundits were saying it was close. I knew Hillary needed a 200,000 vote victory in order to move ahead of Obama in popular votes and SHE DID THIS and then some!!! A 10% victory was sweet!!

We headed over to the Park Hyatt Hotel where the victory party was taking place, but the streets were jammed pack with Hillary supporters and the line was too long to get in - so we just enjoyed the sweet celebrations of Victory near City Hall. Watch my video here.

The next day, with very little sleep, I boarded my delayed flight. The guy sitting next to me said "it's your friend's fault we're delayed." He noted my Hillary button. He said that the Clintons left Philadelphia airport and that delayed all the flights, now he was gonna miss his connection. Yeah, well, so was I. "How does that make you feel?" I told him "I feel just fine, in fact I feel GREAT - I'd miss a flight any day for the next President of United States!"