From the Aug. 14 NYT:
As the health care debate intensifies, the president is turning to his grass-roots network — the 13 million members of Organizing for America — for support.
Mr. Obama engendered such passion last year that his allies believed they were on the verge of creating a movement that could be mobilized again. But if a week’s worth of events are any measure here in Iowa, it may not be so easy to reignite the machine that overwhelmed Republicans a year ago.
More than a dozen campaign volunteers, precinct captains and team leaders from all corners of Iowa, who dedicated a large share of their time in 2007 and 2008 to Mr. Obama, said in interviews this week that they supported the president completely but were taking a break from politics and were not active members of Organizing for America.
Some said they were reluctant to talk to their neighbors about something personal and complicated like health care. And others expressed frustration at the genteel approach, asking why Democrats were not filling the town-hall-style meetings of Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee negotiating health care legislation, or Representative Leonard L. Boswell, a member of the moderate Blue Dog Democratic group.
“It’s a waste of time,” said Gilbert P. Sierra of Davenport, a Democrat who attended an Organizing for America meeting, where about 100 people gathered to vent frustrations and discuss how they could stand up to conservative critics. “Why spend money on this and only be talking to the choir?”
Iowa, where Mr. Obama’s candidacy sprang to life through a neighbor-to-neighbor style of organizing, offers a telling laboratory of the challenges as the president tries to keep at least some of his grass-roots organization active so it has not atrophied when re-election time arrives in three years.
Mitch Stewart, the executive director of Organizing for America who worked as the field director in the Iowa caucuses before running the Virginia operation in the general election, said there was no expectation that every supporter would remain active. Mr. Stewart said the group had chosen not to flood into meetings of Republican members of Congress, but rather to combat what they described as misinformation about the president’s health care plans.
“We’re not geared up to out scream the other side,” Mr. Stewart said in an interview, advocating a more methodical approach. “But if we were not engaged in this effort at all, I think our organization would certainly be asking us why not. They are here to support the president and he needs them at this moment.”
Organizing for America has paid political directors in 44 states, Mr. Stewart said. In recent months the group’s strategy has changed. Gone are the television commercials on health care, climate change and other issues that were broadcast in an effort to pressure moderate Democrats to support the president’s proposals. Now, after the White House received an earful from some of those Democrats, the group has started running advertisements of appreciation.
“Even if they aren’t 100 percent on board, we’re asking our folks to thank our members,” Mr. Stewart said. “Our tactics are continuing to evolve.”