When the audience was first collecting in the room, everybody was asked to sign in and give their name and address. The volunteer sheets did the same. Brewster said we could expect to follow an 80/20 rule with the volunteers; out of every 100 people who signed up to help, 80 would duck out and 20 would help. Still, you always got their names and numbers. We could call them for donations and sell or give their names to various Republican fundraising outfits, and anybody who helped would go into a special category to be called on during re-elections.
There were some basics that had to be learned and obeyed. Fortunately I knew several of them already, from my experience as a salesman on my first go. Every donor got a thank you, from a form letter up to a handwritten note. Big donors got the note plus a phone call. If they volunteered to help, I was to personally call each one and ask how and when they could help. If I couldn't reach them, I needed to leave a message. Brewster had a computer system installed in campaign headquarters with some rudimentary software to follow this stuff, and he gave me a daily phone list of people to call and thank/beg/plead/cajole.
I wondered what Larry Ellison would think if I contracted Oracle to develop the database software needed to track donors and volunteers, and automate communications. Was I thinking ahead of the curve or behind it? I had never paid attention to that in the past. It would take too long to help me now, but in the future? Who knew? We would just have to survive this election first.
Brewster gave me a rundown on what the volunteers would actually be doing. He said, "Everybody thinks they are in charge of the bee hive. Some of them are real worker bees. They will make signs, wave signs, put signs up, make phone calls, drive people to the polls, trail Stewart's appearances with tape recorders, you name it ... You never get enough worker bees."
"Worker bees – got it!", I replied.
"The next best category is the queen bees. These guys actually have some management chops to them. They can figure out where to put signs, how to run a phone tree, supervise the worker bees. They can also work with the worker bees without pissing them off. Very useful.", he continued.
"Queen bees.", I said, nodding.
"The worst category is the drones. They volunteer for whatever damn reason, maybe just to say they worked on a campaign, but they don't actually work, and they occasionally piss off the people that do."
"So why keep them?", I asked.
"Because they might just know somebody who is useful, like a major donor or the head of a local company. You don't want to piss anybody off by proxy."
I rolled my eyes at that. "Any other bees?"
"Killer bees! Those you get rid of! Killer bees are wonderful people you don't want anywhere near you, like the paroled rapist or porn star who just happens to agree with your politics and wants to help."
"Yikes! You get those?"
Brewster nodded and grimaced. "Scary thought, isn't it!? Your – and my – biggest job is figuring out what category to put the volunteers. This thing is going to get very big very quickly, and the two of us won't be able to do it all. We need some of those queen bees as quick as we can get them!"
At the end of every stump speech, I would get some questions. Some of the questions I got were pretty straightforward. How do you plan to balance the budget? (Cut expenses and require that all future programs specify how they are to be paid for as part of the legislation.) What do you feel about the defense budget? (We need to maintain a strong defense budget, but the best way to do that is by making sure our economy is strong - a weak economy will mean a weak defense.) The serious questions we worked out some answers ahead of time.
Some of the questions were trivial - Where do my kids go to school? (Fifth District Elementary.) How old am I? (Thirty-four, but I'll be thirty-five by the election.) Is my wife here? (No, she's at home with the children.) Some were silly - Boxers or briefs? (Only my wife gets to know that answer!) Some I could laugh off - How rich are you? (Really, really rich!)
Some were loaded guns! Pro-life or pro-choice? Do I believe in evolution? Have I been washed in the blood of the lamb? A lot of these types of questions got raised in the more conservative northwestern part of the district, although the abortion one could be anywhere. Sometimes things went well and sometimes they didn't. A typical exchange might be one that I had with a fellow out in Thurmont. We were meeting in a hall provided by the local Chamber of Commerce. During the question and answer period, this fellow stood up and wanted to know if I was pro-life or pro-choice.
"Pro choice.", I said.
As I expected, there was a low murmur of disapproval from the crowd. Sometimes it ended at that, but in this case, the fellow wanted to argue with me. I let him ramble about a minute before I made a time-out sign and interrupted him. "Excuse me, but I know this is important to you. What's your name?"
"Why do you need to know that?", he asked belligerently.
"Because I'm a polite guy, and it's nicer to call you by your name than by saying 'hey, you!'", I replied, smiling.
That got a few chuckles around the room, and I got an answer a lot less belligerent. "Tim Timmerman."
"Tim, I'm Carl. Nice to meet you. Okay, like I said, I know this is important to you. To you abortion is wrong. We're ending a life. I understand that, I truly do. To me it's a matter of women's health and control over her own body. Now, you and I are probably never going to agree on this, am I right on that?"
"It's wrong! Killing the unborn is a sin!"
Great, the guy is on the religious side. "Okay, Tim, I understand you, but like I said, I don't agree with you. That leaves you with a couple of questions. Ready?"
He looked startled at that. "What?"
"First, is that the only thing you care about? And I mean the only thing at all! Because if it is, I'll respect you, but I'll tell you, right now, not to vote for me, because I don't think I'm changing my mind on this one."
That caused a stir. A politician who said not to vote for him? They must have been expecting me to say something mealy-mouthed and promise to consider it or something. I could see several people looking at each other in confusion. I just pushed on. "And here's the second question to ask yourself. Do you think Andy Stewart is going to agree with you? You already know the answer to that one."
I stopped talking to Tim and addressed the group as a whole. "And that is something for everybody to think about. Let's be fair about this. There are probably going to be some things I believe in that you might disagree with. It might be the budget, or programs like Social Security or Medicare or Welfare, or defense. It might be something else, like abortion or gun control. There are probably going to be some things we are just going to have to agree to disagree on. You all have to ask yourself if you can live with that, or if you have to go with Brand X - and you know he's going to be a lot more liberal than I am on this stuff. I'm here to tell you how I feel and plan to do the job. I am not going to sit here and lie to you and tell you something I don't believe."
Sometimes this defused the situation nicely. I remember after the meeting, as I was shaking hands, I met Timmerman again. He tried to convince me about the evils of abortion again, and I spoke a little more on it with him. "Tim, in some ways I agree with you. My wife and I love our kids. We have three. Last year we were in a car wreck and we lost a fourth child while Marilyn was still pregnant, and it was just devastating to us. It was simply terrible, and now we can't have any more children. We could never do this ourselves. Marilyn agrees with you, by the way. She is totally pro-life. She and I disagree on this, and I think you and I are going to disagree as well." He looked a bit perplexed as he realized I was missing the horns and tail, and shook my hand and departed. A few minutes later I saw him head over to the 'tip jar', the big jar we kept on a table for contributions, and drop a twenty in it. He saw me looking at him, and we nodded at each other.