| I've been in Chicago researching a sequel to Mike Royko's "Boss" that covers the career of the current Mayor, Richard Daley. I found out some interesting things about how the Obama campaign in Chicago is viewing the campaign nationally and implementing strategies to bring back the grass roots ethos for the general election in the fall.
My source within the Obama campaign in Chicago has told me campaign employees have had it up to their ears with overly ambitious Ivy League volunteers who have been causing problems for the campaign by putting their individual ambitions over the larger goals of the campaign as a movement. This employee and fellow South Side native has shared with me that the campaign is getting a sense that the attitudes of dedicated Ivy League volunteers had, over the course of the primary, given Republicans enough stories to run with the 'elitist' trope in the general election.
In Pennsylvania, where the campaign lost big time to Hillary due to pushy Penn students stoking conflict with long-time city activists, the Obama campaign has instituted a training that teaches volunteers how to be senstive to existing communities.
"They (Ivy League) students come on with this attitude that this is their big break," the source said as she edited a video for the campaign in the Roosevelt Road Kinko's. "I've got news for them, they're not getting jobs."
Evidently, according to this source, Senator Obama himself feels Ivy League graduates have held sway over Washington too long and even though he attended Harvard and Columbia, if elected, he intends to do very little hiring from the Ivies. "There is a general sense around the campaign that the Ivy kids are self-interested and out of touch with the general campaign culture."
In Chicago, campaign workers still remain amazed at the reception Senator Obama receives in other cities. "We are out of touch with the phenomenon that he has become. He's just a guy everyone knows here, no big deal."
Additionally, Chicagoians and Chicago-based campaign workers have become more vocal about local politicians doing business as usual in ways that could give Republicans fuel for their 'Chicago corruption' fire. Many people I have talked to feel that local political figures like Todd Stroger should resign in order to signal that Chicago is reforming.
"Obama has given so much hope to the world and the narrow view of the Chicago political machine doesn't seem to understand what that means," said the source.
The interview with the unnamed source was done at the Kinko's at Canal and Roosevelt Road on July 23 at 2:30 a.m.. The source was editing unstaged video footage for the campaign that demonstrated the support Obama was garnering from working-class white Americans. "We have miles of footage of Obama signs in the middle of cornfields and in front of barns. We're working on something that debunks the myth that working class whites don't support Obama."
As the campaign advances into the general election, word from the inside is that additional general election hiring will lean heavily towards Midwestern colleges.
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