Obama’s experiment with an open platform
Dante Chinni
Posted: 07.30.2008 / 8:27 AM PDT
Barack Obama’s campaign makes a point of focusing on his followers. In his e-mails, on his website, and even in his stump speeches, he portrays himself as a man standing on the shoulders of millions of supporters.
Earlier this month, he e-mailed his faithful that he was going to put the party’s future in their hands. “Traditionally, the drafting of the platform is not open to ordinary people,” read a bulk e-mail. “This year, that’s going to change.”
The message invited readers to small local “platform meetings” being held around the country and showed them how to create their own meeting “so we can incorporate your ideas in the party’s platform.” The idea was to hold hundreds of meetings scattered in libraries, cafes, and restaurants from July 19 through the 27.
But what exactly does a local platform meeting look like? To get a feel, Patchwork Nation attended one last week in Chicago, Senator Obama’s hometown. We found a lot of excitement at the Yassa African Restaurant and more than a bit of chaos.
The crowd at the small restaurant eventually grew to 17, and in some ways it was a true example of the power of Obama’s online organizing powers. The assembled – which included Zoe Mikva, wife of former White House counsel Abner Mikva – was mostly from the South Side, and most did not know one another.
The organizer, Demba Ndiaye, who said he had never been involved in politics before 2008, used all the tools the Obama camp provided – sign-in sheets, talking points. He spoke with the conviction of a true believer.
“This drafting of a platform, it used to be in Washington, but now they are opening it up to us,” he enthusiastically told the crowd. “This is not ready-made. We have to make it happen.”
But making it happen isn’t easy in a room full of strangers with conflicting concerns. The list of topics the group wanted to address in the two-hour meeting was lengthy: healthcare, the environment, economics, education, foreign affairs, and youth development. That’s not exactly a two-hour meeting agenda.
A woman named Lillian said she just wanted to make sure alternative medicines were part of the healthcare plank, and she then explained her anger with the current system.
“What you said is just a screed against the AMA [American Medical Association],” Ms. Mikva said.
“Absolutely,” replied Lillian.Why is healthcare so expensive?, one person wondered. The group agreed that the big healthcare industry is to blame. The conversation veered off into a discussion of why cigarette taxes are good and bad and the perils of water fluoridation.
When the conversation turned to the environment, one attendee, a man who called himself only Chaka, said he had a plan for global warming to be used to improve people’s lives. It was complicated, he said, but he had written on it.
Mr. Ndiaye put up an admirable fight, trying to bring the conversation back to Obama’s desire to take power away from the “special interests.” But platforms are not easy for anyone to craft. Even among generally like-minded people, drawing lines on issues is complicated.
Still, there was general agreement on some very broad points. Almost everyone seemed to believe that the government’s “regulatory bodies” needed to be strengthened. And they generally agreed that the Democratic Party should take a stand against those much-hated “special interests” – whatever they are exactly.
There was also wide agreement among the attendees, nearly all of whom were African-American, that English should be the official US language – a statement that would be incredibly controversial for the Democrats.
Somehow, out of the meeting, Ndiaye was able to craft four points for the platform – on health, energy and environment, economics and foreign affairs, and education – which he e-mailed to everyone a few days later.
“[C]itizens enrolled in any health care plan developed by the government should be able to choose alternative practitioners, treatments, methods, and products if they wish,” said one statement in the meeting’s draft report.
“Corporate social responsibility must be enforced minimizing the current outsourcing trends,” said another.
Most of the points, in other words, were vague and difficult to argue, like traditional platform statements. (English as the national language didn’t make the cut.) And of course, they will be edited by party officials and mashed up with hundreds of other statements from the local meetings.
One could argue that Obama’s effort at opening up the process was a success in that it further engaged voters and got them more invested in him and his candidacy.
And to be fair, people who attended other meetings have reported a much more orderly and organized process.
Then again, the “it’s all about you” path that the Obama camp is on is full of challenges. What happens with all this goodwill and optimism when it bumps into reality?
Like the campaign itself, the attendees were all in favor of change. The problem is what change means is different to everyone. And eventually, many are almost certain to go away disappointed.
