Leave it all on the road

Senaotr Kerry wrote this yesterday on www.dailykos.com.  Today is election day and it's definitely time for all hands on deck!

Leave it all on the road. I see that that's the slogan here, and as a competitive cyclist, I know the feeling. You can't hold anything back, and you can't take anything for granted.

The polls look good, but let me tell you, the early exit polls four years ago looked fantastic. But the cliché is true: polls don't matter. Only votes do. And the large majority of those votes will be cast tomorrow. We have to do everything we possibly can to blow the Republican GOTV effort out of the water.

If we're up by 4 in the polls in a state, we can win by 7. If we're tied, we can win by 3. If we all do our best right now, we'll not only win this election, but win the kind of mandate we need to actually change our country.

All of you remember what we went through last year. I'd come here to this community, and we'd talk about what we could do to pressure a few more Republicans to try to see the light and chart a new course on Iraq, or give more kids health care, or anything else that they blocked. That's what a small, unworkable majority can bring.

This next day can change all that. We can have a true Democratic majority, filled with new progressives ready to move this country - finally! - into the 21st century. But we have to get absolutely every vote we can get. So please do what you can to get-out-the-vote. Head over the Barack's website to see what you can do:

Volunteer!

And then email everyone in your address book that address and ask them to do what they can.

I was in New Hampshire this past weekend, and it was incredible. The organization that the Obama campaign has built is enormous, and it's able to put huge numbers of people to work. But that organization depends on those people actually showing up to do that work. And "those people" are YOU. You are the bedrock of the Democratic Party, the activists who make it all work.

And this is a time to make it work. As Barack has said many times, you don't run to the finish line, you run through the finish line.

Because you know whom we know is working hard? John McCain and Sarah Palin are working hard, along with the Republican Party, criss-crossing the country and continuing their misleading attacks on Barack Obama. But we can overwhelm them because we have truth on our side, and we have you. If they drive a voter to the polls, we should drive three, four, five voters to the polls. If they make one call, we should make five.

So check out what you can do by clicking here to volunteer. And you can find your polling place by clicking here:

http://VoteForChange.com

Pass that URL around to everyone you know so they can find their polling place as well.

If we can turn all of our supporters out, if we can all go to the polls and bring people with us, our country will never be the same. We need a victory large enough that the personal attacks of the McCain campaign are discredited, the policies of the Bush-McCain GOP are repudiated, and the ideology of the extreme right is rejected, once and for all.

And then we can work together on how to get this country moving again, instead of just trying to limit the damage of a Republican President and his Roadblock Republican allies.

Tomorrow is election day. This is our time.

8 Comments

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Congrats on your re-election Senator.  I can’t believe it was four years ago tonight that we all gathered in Boston in the hope that ypu would be our next President.  That was a very rough night, but here we are four years later under much better circumstances.  Tonight is a very good night for America.

Mary from Manhattan

Posted by Mary from Manhattan in New York City | 11/05/08, 12:11 AM EST

thank you for bringing Barack Obama before the nation; you should take satisfaction in being a large part of this historic occasion.  the future looks brighter today. thanks!

Posted by d kustom in illinois ( www ) | 11/05/08, 08:05 AM EST

Congratulations to presidential elect Barack Obama!
And many thanks to Senator Kerry for his strong support in making this possible. The world seems to be a better place today. Change has already happened, and more is just around the corner. Great!

Being very interested, I noticed that Senator Kerry is among those considered for a position at the White House. I enthusiastically support this, and I’m sure hundreds of millions of world citizen do, too. John Kerry has become an icon for a more tolerant US all around the globe in 2004, and his vast knowledge about foreign policy makes him one of the most qualified candidates for Secretary of State or US ambassador at the UN. This brings back memories of Adlay Stevenson, another former presidential candidate who brilliantly succeeded when serving for his nation at the UN. So, I beg Senator Kerry to seriously consider taking up a prominent role in the new administration. This could not only become his finest hour, but a tremendous boon for the US.

Posted by Gray in Germany | 11/08/08, 05:41 AM EST

I am so glad thet Barack Obama is our President-Elect. Finally people that did not ever vote before registered and voted Democratic, because so many people realized that we could not continue the horrible policies of the Bush- Cheney Adminstration. I wish that John Kerry had become President in 2004. Thanks to John Kerry for his help in this election. If John Kerry becomes Secretary of State, that would wonderful. If he stays in the U. S. senate, he will do a lot of good for the American people, I know!

Posted by John Stone in Mason City, Iowa 50401 | 11/08/08, 10:16 AM EST

As a British person who has been following this election from - you guessed it -  Britain, I have to say I really really hope President Obama appoints John Kerry as Secretary of State. Although Senator Kerry did not win the 2004 election, he is still viewed by many as the opposition to the Bush administration because of that very election. Thus, appointing Senator Kerry as Secretary of State would be an extra powerful way of saying to the world “America is BACK!!” YAY!!!! :D

YES WE CAN!!!

Posted by Justin in Bristol, England | 11/09/08, 07:59 PM EST

Hi Senator Kerry,

Do you have tickets to the Obama Inauguration?

Posted by Sandra Gates in Illinois ( www ) | 11/11/08, 08:13 AM EST

I thought Bush was a great president. I’m not sure why he gets so much blame for the problems of this country.

Take the recent economic crisis. Any moron can point to the government and say it was their fault, but what about the business “leaders”?

Weren’t THEY in charge of this problem? Didn’t THEY set the economy up for failure? Shouldn’t THEY face criminal prosecution for their haphazzard decisions?

I think running to the government to fix all your ills is weak. I say America let George Bush down, and not the other way around.

Stop bashing George Bush and start bashing the real culprits!!

Posted by Paul in Illinois | 11/15/08, 12:57 PM EST

Dear Senator Kerry,

I maxed out in your last two senatorial campaigns as well as in your Presidential campaign. I’m deeply disappointed in the role that you have obviously played in letting Joe Lieberman keep his committee. Like many others I worked tirelessly to reelect you and to elect Barack Obama. We fought for change we could believe in. Well, obviously we couldn’t believe in you. We fought for you, we donated for you, we canvassed for you we phonebanked for you, and you? You go ahead and reward the traitor that worked agaibst us for the last two years? What spineless cowards you and your colleages are. I never imagined that I would say something like this about you, Senator. Well, I guess, you don’t care anyway. At least for another for years until the next campaign, when you claim again to stand up for us. Well, rest assured, that I won’t stand up for you and your spineless coleages again. Neither will I donate.

Posted by Patrick S. in Cambridge | 11/18/08, 03:56 PM EST