"The nature of a 'McCainiac' is to face long odds and keep fighting," said state Sen. Bill Baroni (R., Mercer) the chairman of McCain's Jersey operation.
Baroni feels Republicans are solidly in McCain's corner and the strategy for now is to go after swing towns. Those are communities where voters tend to split their votes. He said the McCain New Jersey campaign has made more than 200,000 phone calls from nine phone banks around the state. "Those are voters who can be persuaded," he said.
Kevin Collins, a GOP strategist who has worked extensively with blue-collar voters in New Jersey, predicted: "The McCain campaign will do well with Reagan Democrats. The question is how well and if it will be enough to offset the strong desire for change."
New Jersey Democrats have embraced that desire and are exporting their enthusiasm for it.
"We have even more volunteers than, at times, we know what to do with," said U.S. Rep. Steve Rothman (D., N.J.), an early Obama supporter who chairs the Illinois Senator's northeast regional effort. "We are fully staffed here in New Jersey in terms of volunteer efforts and GOTV [get out the vote] on election day. So, we've decided for those who can travel and are willing to travel to go to Pennsylvania and Ohio and to other swing states."
Obama's New Jersey spokesman, Andrew Poag, said the campaign has been sending "scores" of Garden State volunteers to Pennsylvania since September to canvass voters there. Typically, he said, they've been meeting on weekends in parking lots in New Jersey and car pooling over the bridges to knock on doors under their "Drive for Change" campaign. They also are making phone calls into Pennsylvania.
Perhaps making up for supporting Sen. Hillary Clinton (D., N.Y.) in the Feb. 5 primary, Gov. Corzine has been stumping for Obama as well.
