WI volunteering last weekend (1 of 3): Convinced undecideds?.

Last weekend in Wisconsin I may have convinced 2 undecided voters...  I meet them a lot, but I never get strong reactions where I think I've actually changed someone's mind:

1) One house was on a corner, and the way it was set up with a door on the corner and the side and these high, long, and thin windows that you couldn't see in, you could tell it was a converted bar.

I knocked on the door, and a smoking (white) woman in her mid-40s asked me in to talk after she said she didn't know which way she was voting quite yet, and there was an old (white) woman at the kitchen table drinking coffee and smoking and another (white) woman in her mid-40s smoking and drinking coffee.

The room was very smoky, and the woman who answered the door said that she's union and would be a Democrat all the way, except abortion really makes her pause.

"Well, abortion's a very difficult issue," I said, "And I'm uncomfortable with it myself, in some ways," and then I continued on to say that people who were pro-life could reasonably vote either Democrat or Republican, because while Republicans would ban it, studies show Democratic policies reduce it.

"Forget that," the other woman said, leaping into the conversation. "It's not about the baby, it's about controlling your body.  And the Republicans don't do anything about it, they just want the votes to do other stuff.  Don't you get that?"

Then, she turned to me, "I keep telling her that!"

"If that study is what you say it is," the woman was like, ignoring the other woman for a second, "I'll definitely vote Democratic."

Then, she gave me her email, and I told her I'd email her from my personal account, and when I got back to the office I found the study that provision of contraception through the Affordable Care Act will lower abortion rates massively.

2) One apartment was in back and the guy had a Spanish name, and when I went around back, there was this plump hispanic guy in a purple polo shirt talking with his landlord about the installation of a satellite dish.

I identified myself, and he was like, "One minute!", and his landlord said he supported Ron Paul, and they finished the conversation and the landlord left and I began to talk to the guy about Obama.

The hispanic guy said he would support Obama, but he didn't know much and wasn't too motivated to vote.

So, I began fishing around with issues, and I gave my testimony about Obama saving GM.

He was cold.

So, I said that a lot of hispanic friends, one Mexican-American and one whose parents were refugees from El Salvador, were very happy how Obama fights for the Dream Act, and has stopped deportation of youths who have finished high school and have no criminal records.

"And he doesn't stoke hate against hispanics, because that's just not right and just not his style," I was like.  "But I don't know if you have friends or family that this affects..."

The guy then identified himself as Spanish, and said he really didn't, though he had seemed to perk up against when I talked about the anti-hispanic stuff being wrong.

Then, he invited me upstairs because he was getting cold standing outside, he was in sandals and everything and it was pretty chilly with the wind.

I went upstairs, and he was like, "My boyfriend's been harrassing me to vote, he totally supports Obama."

At that point, I told him that Tammy Baldwin who was running for Senate was an out lesbian.

"Really?", he was like.

"Yes," I was like, "She doesn't talk about it too much since she talks about the economy since that's what most people are worried about right now, but she doesn't hide it, either."

"That is awesome," he was like, "Lesbians know how to get things done!  And they're tough, too."

I then filled him in on her bio, and he was totally stoked to vote, and I left early voter info for him and told him to get it to his boyfriend too, which he agreed to do.