For the next several months, living in a battleground state will be an absolute thrill.
For the political junkie, nothing is more fun that living in a battleground state in a presidential election season. In 2004, Wisconsin was decided by less than one percent of the vote, and early polling data show this election is going to be just as close.
Because we’re a purple state, both the Obama and McCain campaigns are going to commit significant resources to winning Wisconsin. The candidates, their wives, their running mates and other surrogates are going to visit constantly. In 2004, students from Marquette got up close and personal with President Bush, Vice President Cheney, First Lady Laura Bush, and other prominent figures. These surrogates include more than just the politicians – Marquette’s College Democrats hosted a visit by the actor Jake Gyllenhall, and Natalie Portman visited the MillerTime pub downtown. Republicans brought in NASCAR racers and Mayor Rudy Guiliani.
These high-profile visitors often come to the Milwaukee area because it is the state’s biggest media market. Sometimes they come directly to campus.
I can remember a phone call from the Bush headquarters in 2004, when I was the head of the Students for Bush group on campus: Daniel – the Bush twins, Jenna and Barbara, are going to visit campus next week. We need you to get the name, social security number, and birth date of the 200 people you’re going to get to attend for the Secret Service to check out. We ended up exceeding our goal for attendance, had a great event, and were very pleased that John Edwards’ daughter drew only 50 people to an event on campus the next week.
All of these visitors come with cameras in tow. Another time we got a call – CNN wants footage of Students for Bush doing a phone bank and campaigning door to door. So on one day’s notice, we pulled together volunteers in a room in the AMU basement with a box of cell phones, and started calling through lists of undecided voters. We only got to meet the producer, but Judy Woodruff did the voice-over narration on the story.
News reporters love “what are the young people thinking” stories, and they’ll often stop random Marquette students walking around campus for a quick interview. This will be especially the case with Barack Obama’s supposed unique appeal to our generation.
And there will be all the other parts of the circus that is a national campaign. TV ads will take over your evening news. There will be volunteers outside Raynor wearing matching t-shirts and passing out quarter-sheets urging you to vote a certain way or to attend a certain rally.
My advice: Dive in. Drink it up. You can meet cool people, make great
memories, and no matter what your political affiliation, fulfill Marquette’s mission to “be the difference.”
*Daniel Suhr is a recent graduate of Marquette’s Law School, and the former chairman of Students for Bush.
