My First Time Canvassing

Hello All, I got this email to our group from Rob and wanted to share it with you. From: ronpaul-18@meetup.com [mailto:ronpaul-18@meetup.com] On Behalf Of Rob Sent: Saturday, December 08, 2007 4:41 PM To: ronpaul-18@meetup.com Subject: [ronpaul-18] It's easy to go D2D Hi all, Just wanted to encourage everyone who hasn't canvassed yet to get out there and give it a try! It's surprisingly easy and rewarding, and meeting other RP supporters is tons of fun. I was very intimidated and even a little skeptical at the thought of knocking on strangers' doors and speaking politics to them, but Scott, David, and Jun were great teachers. To give you an idea, here's how I approached it: 1) Read about the D2D meetups for weeks on end before finally deciding to give it a try 2) Head out with someone experienced and see how it's done (Scott's Mountain View meetups are great for this)--for the first few houses I didn't say a word, but you're helping just by being a second smiling face at their doorstep. 3) Start to chime in, take the lead at a few houses, and rotate through with other members--you learn more from each person, and start to build up your own style 4) I then went off on my own just for a bit--I had nobody to step in when I was lost for words, so I learned a lot very quickly After (4), I was pretty comfortable going D2D, and getting better at handling peoples' questions. Still, though, it's much more fun to go D2D in pairs, and I think the results are far superior. Today, David McBride and I covered about 50 houses (I left early--he's still going!), and there were a couple of really cool tactics he used to get the attention of non-republicans. 1) When they say "I'm a democrat", David would mention that RP is drawing support from republicans, democrats, and independents alike, and that "Ron Paul is a constitutionalist--and that's something that people from both parties can support." I was amazed how well this worked. 2) When it came time to hand out the voter registration forms, he'd say "Here's a form to register republican" (the person, of course, shudders at this word), "and here's another one to switch back after the primaries"... this always got a good laugh, and I think it makes people much more likely to switch (it emphasizes that the switch isn't permanent). Plus, that form might be used by the person's spouse. Anyways, I just wanted to share how surprisingly easy and fun it is to go D2D, and encourage anybody who's 'on the fence' to take the next step and try it--it's not nearly as hard as you might think. -Rob