Me and Hillary - Part 1: Introduction

It's been about three months since I stormed out of the Philadelphia office of Hillary Clinton for President. I barely exchanged a word with the two staffers I had been working with for a month in central Pennsylvania before I drove off looking for a Hotel in downtown Philly.

How did I get to that point? We'll that's what I've been meaning to write about for three months, but I kept putting it off. It seemed like such a daunting task to cover five of the most intense months of my life. I also couldn't decide exactly how I was going to write it. Would it be a painfully long memoir or a short blog? Would the tone be serious and hopefully insightful or casual?

So here's the story of a Canadian who joined an American presidential campaign. Let's see what happens.

It really started back in 2004 when I was watching the last election unfold from my cramped single apartment in London, Ontario. I was in my fourth year at the University of Western Ontario and had recently become fascinated with American politics in the volatile years after September 11^th. I had just witnessed the beginning of the Iraq war and had begun to debate friends about its merits.

I became hooked on the daily events of the final 2 months of the election campaign and made myself a promise that somehow, four years down the road, I would be in some way involved in the 2008 contest.

Flash forward (so cliché!) to fall 2007. I was in Montreal doing an eight-week public relations certificate at Concordia University, and had naturally been paying attention to the run-up to the 2008 primaries since, well, November 3^rd 2004.

One day I was discussing my interest in American politics with my PR teacher and she suggested that I just drive down as soon as the program was over, walk into a campaign office, and offer to help the candidate of my choosing. I had no idea it would be so easy, and would later find out how desperate political campaigns are for volunteer help.

I wasn't about to just drive south and hope for the best, so I did some research. I searched the websites of my top three candidates; Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama. I had for a long time liked Joe Biden and thought he had the right ideas, experience, and charisma. I considered him my top choice, even though his chances were slim. Of the more likely candidates, I had for a long time admired Hillary Clinton's intelligence and strength, and really appreciated how she would kick ass in most debates. Since I saw him speak at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, I thought Barack Obama's story as fascinating and expected to see a lot of him in the future of American politics.

On the candidate's websites I discovered internship applications for the early contests, Iowa and New Hampshire. Since New Hampshire was only four hours drive from Montreal, I applied for New Hampshire internships for all three campaigns. Sure I had my preferences, but above all I wanted to get a taste, so I didn't put all my eggs in one basket.

The response I got from the campaigns had a big influence on where I went. It took two weeks for someone from Joe Biden's campaign to email me back and invite me to an event somewhere in southern New Hampshire. Obama's campaign called me within a few days, saying that they would love to have me but had to get back to me on details. I never heard back. Hillary Clinton's campaign called me the day after I sent in my application, asking when I could schedule a formal phone interview. I did the interview the next week and was offered an internship.

I was pretty ecstatic at this point. As someone who was looking to start a career in communications or journalism, the prospect of putting Hillary Clinton for President on my resume was pretty awesome.

I spent the next few days mapping out my plans between the beginning of December and the New Hampshire primary on January 8^th. I decided to head down for two weeks, return for Christmas break and new years, and then go back to New Hampshire for the final week before the primary.

Unbelievably, a few days before I was assigned a campaign office, some crazy guy took the Rochester, New Hampshire campaign office hostage for entire day. It was all over the news. Actually, that's not true. I listened to local Montreal news radio station CJAD 800 in the car that day hoping for updates and heard nothing. It really turned me off on AM radio and convinced me to get satellite radio in my car. Luckily no one was hurt in Rochester, and Hillary made a great speech that night and called the families of the staffers. It made my parents wonder if they would be getting a call from Hillary Rodham Clinton in a few weeks.

A few days later, after things had calmed down, I was assigned to Berlin, New Hampshire, the furthest north and most remote campaign office. I was hoping for head office in Manchester, and got pretty much the exact opposite. I packed my car and on January 8^th, 2007, I drove down from Montreal to the Vermont border with my google maps directions and almost immediately got lost.