Via Daily Kos, at Working America’s ‘Main Street’ blog, Doug Foote’s post “There are undecided voters in Virginia. Lots of Them” calls attention to a problem the Obama campaign must address over the next few days, and he offers a credible solution.
Foote acknowledges the data evidence that there are very few undecided voters left, as well as all of the ads directed at them to influence their votes. But after accompanying a door to door canvasser in an effort to identify undecided voters in Leesburg, Virginia, he concludes that (a.) there are in fact plenty of undecided voters left, (b.) Many of them will not be swayed by ads, and (c.) the best way to reach them is to engage them in respectful conversation, sharing real experiences.
Foote’s post is mostly anecdotal. But the conversations he relates ring true. These are real people talking, not strereotypes culled from data-driven analysis. As Foote explains:

I went out canvassing with Giordano “Gio” Hardy-Gerena, a Field Manager with Working America. Our task was to identify Obama and Kaine supporters on the winding roads of the Leesburg suburbs. A tribute to Working America’s data operation, we still talked to undecided and leaners on both sides, even on streets where Obama and Romney signs covered their neighbors’ lawns.
“Whenever one of those political ads comes on, I just change the channel,” one man told us on his front porch. Still, when we talked to him, he was interested in talking about the issues, and in comparing the candidates.
Between work, children, and other commitments, many folks in Leesburg just hadn’t had time to consider the election. It’s a fact that Beltway media and politicos scoff at — but ignoring it, or mocking it, or even worse, minimizing the numbers, doesn’t win elections. Not everyone has the time or firehose-exposure to media and politics. One woman with four kids running around her front hall apologized as Gio began his rap: “I’m sorry, it’s homework time.”
Even among voters who had been following the race, support for either candidate was far from solidified. “I’m just tired of the partisanship,” a fifty-something life-long Republican sighed. His job is tied to defense contracting, and like many in the area he’s not too pleased with talk of sequestration. We pointed out George Allen’s record in the Senate, where he racked up the debt that put us in our current fiscal position.
“My wife is probably voting for Kaine,” he said. “Reaching across the aisle right here at home!” I joked, “showing those politicians a good example.” We then were able to talk about Kaine’s bipartisan work as governor, versus Allen’s “my way or the highway” approach in the Bush years.
He was far from the only split-ticket home, which broke all stereotypes: women for Allen and Romney, men for Obama and Kaine, people of color voting straight ticket for the GOP, and pro-lifers strongly considering third-party candidates. This state – and let’s face it this country – doesn’t abide simple political stereotypes.

Foote then relates a story of one voter, they call Jonathan, who they just couldn’t convince, and who said he will probably flip a coin. The point being that there are some voters truly don’t know who they will vote for until they cast their ballot. But there are many others who are persuadable, if it’s done the right way, as Foote describes:

So what’s the takeaway? TV ads and mailers aren’t going to win the commonwealth of Virginia for Obama and Kaine – nor their opponents for that matter. And while our one-on-one conversations turned many undecided voters into leaners, we need a special ingredient for folks like Jonathan: personal stories.
Involving personal stories into the rap at the door is something Virginia Field Director Dan O’Malley stressed to our organizers in the afternoon briefing. “Instead of just saying that George Allen will end Medicare as we know it, talk about a parent, relative, or someone in your life who relies on those benefits,” he said. And many of them do have those experiences to share–it propels the work they do. “I started talking about how hard it was for me to get healthcare and it really changed the conversation,” said Sarah, a canvasser fresh out of college.
Maybe that tactic didn’t get Jonathan to budge away from his “coin-flip” stance. But in those areas where ads, debates, and 24-hour coverage haven’t made a difference, making the election personal in old school, one-on-one interactions is the only tool in our toolbox that can succeed where Karl Rove’s millions have failed.

At TDS we like data-driven analysis to help formulate political strategy, and we applaud the deployment of modern scientific techniques that are being used to help win elections. But after all of the political scientists and wonks have had their say, persuasion of individual voters at the case by case level is more of an art than a science. It’s important to have good candidates, who project real humanity to connect with persuadable voters. But it’s not always enough. We have to both listen to voters and share our experiences in marshalling our case if we want to win new hearts and minds to support the Democratic cause.

Another tense day as polls begin to slowly turn in Obama’s direction, and Michael Bloomberg trumps Chris Christie’s praise of the president with an actual endorsement.
Here’s some items from today’s blogging at Washington Monthly that may be of particular interest to TDS readers:
* The bizarre conservative demonization of FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver may reflect foundation being laid for post-election blame game.
* The extrusions of GOP pols on rape and abortion reflect a re-framing of the reproductive rights debate in a manner favorable to the pro-choice cause, but also perversely help extremists like Mitt Romney pose as moderates.
* Two prominent Catholic “pro-life” voices weigh in on the elections in very different ways.
* Voters “disappointed” by Obama’s failure to achieve bipartisanship sure to be disappointed again if Mitt wins–for the exact same reasons.

UAW President Bob King weighs in with a USA Today op-ed, “Romney’s auto mess shows he is not ready.” Says King: “This is the real Romney, a man who objected to the rescue of the domestic auto industry, then made astronomical profits after his business partners threatened the survival of GM. A man who lies about Chrysler moving jobs to China, when his history at Bain Capital, the private equity firm he founded, shows that he has invested in Chinese factories where workers are grossly exploited. Romney won’t even act to stop the Sensata factory in Illinois, in which he is an investor, from closing the doors and moving to China the day before the election…That is the picture of a me-first hedge-fund investor, not someone who has the judgment or character to be President of the United States.”
What the final skeds of the presidential candidates say about their closing strategies.
Jennifer Steinhauer of NYT’s ‘The Caucus’ flags “10 House Races to Watch,” noting “While there are more than 10 competitive races, some of them even closer than the ones we have listed list here, these House races are 10 worth watching.” They are: CA 15 and 36; CO 6; FL 18; IL 17; IA 3; GA 12; MA 6; NY 27; and UT 4.
At the Crystal Ball, Larry J. Sabato and Kyle Kondik are more confident that Dems will hold the senate than the white house.
But Robert Schlesinger reports at U.S. News that Nate Silver estimates at this point about 294+ electoral votes for Obama, while other forecasters also see an E.V. edge for Obama: “The Princeton Election Consortium, run by Professor Sam Wang, projects Obama pulling in 303 electoral votes, for example; Votamatic, which is run by Drew Linzer, a professor at Emory and Stanford, predicts 332 electoral votes for Obama; Real Clear Politics’s “No Toss Up States” map gives Obama 281 electoral votes. (Huffington Post’s Pollster.com gives Obama a base of 253 electoral votes and leads in five of toss-up states as compared with 206 electoral votes and a single toss-up state lead for Romney.) And the major online betting markets all give Obama pretty good odds of re-election (Intrade puts it at 63.3 percent chance, and Betfair says 68 percent).”
WaPo columnist E. J. Dionne, Jr. explains why Democrats will remain the more pro-compromise party: “To hold their Senate majority, Democrats need to keep winning in smaller and rural states that lean Republican. Republicans almost everywhere — Brown is the exception — now live in fear of losing primaries to tea party candidates such as Mourdock…Thus is compromise on the ballot next week. But only one side seems genuinely interested in reaching it.”
But the latest Associated Press-GfK poll indicates “Almost half of likely voters, 47 percent, think the Republican challenger would be better at ending the logjam, compared with 37 percent for Obama.” Further, “about 1 out of 6 likely voters didn’t take a side on the gridlock issue: 6 percent weren’t sure who would do a better job at getting Washington moving and 10 percent didn’t trust either man to break the impasse among congressional partisans.”
Steve Bousquet of the Tampa Bay Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau notes the rather sudden disappearance of FL Gov. Rick Scott from Romney campaign events and quotes Republican political scientist Darryl Paulson: “I think it is prudent to stay arm’s length from anyone in the party who might alienate the few undecided voters who are left.”
At The Daily Beast Michael Tomasky has some good tips for President Obama in the closing days of the election, including: “Florida? Let Joe Biden and Bill Clinton take care of south Florida. The alter kockers are more their crowd. Obama needs to hit the I-4 corridor, where the white swing voters and the Puerto Ricans (and plenty enough African Americans) live, with a huge weekend rally, probably in Tampa. He carried Tampa’s Hillsborough County 50-48 last time, and if he can replicate that, he has a shot at Florida, which would crush Romney.”
Andy Kroll reports at Mother Jones on MoveOn’s use of 12 million “voter report cards” in battleground states, grading voters on how often they have voted in the past — and comparing their grade with the average of their neighbors. The technique is credited with helping Democrat Michael Bennet win in the 2010 Senate race in Colorado.