Turning Out the Vote: With the U.S. electorate split almost 50-50, voter turnout among minorities, young voters and the jobless hold the key to victory in November.

But the JOBS! strategy’s most intriguing element is its reliance on getting out the vote in large urban counties like Los Angeles, Cook, New York, Cuyahoga, Philadelphia, Wayne, and King. Virtually ignored in recent presidential elections, these counties were either too solidly in the Democratic column or too expensive to win in the closing weeks. Yet those counties offer concentrated pockets of the unemployed and huge blocks of registered non-voters.
 
Five brief examples will show what is possible:

In Cuyahoga County, Ohio, the unemployment rate is now 5.6 percent. In 2000 Al Gore won the county by 168,000 votes even as 458,000 registered voters stayed home.

In Wayne County, Michigan, the unemployment rate is now 7.0 percent. Gore won the county by 307,000 votes. Yet 591,000 registered voters stayed home.
 
In Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, the unemployment rate is 5.4 percent. Gore won the county by 338,000 votes. And yet, 465,300 registered voters stayed home.

In King County, Washington, the unemployment rate is 7.5 percent. Gore won the county by 204,000 votes while 260,000 registered voters stayed home.
In Los Angeles County, the unemployment rate is 6.8 percent. Gore won the county by 839,000 votes despite 1.49 million registered voters staying home.
 
The registered non-voters in just those five counties number over 3.26 million! And that’s just scratching the surface of what is possible.
 
There are hundreds of counties that are black, bruised and bleeding. And their percentage of registered non-voters has to exceed their percentage of the unemployed.
 
The JOBS! strategy rallies those who have been marginalized economically and politically. It forces the GOP to defend more territory and, even more important, forces them to defend their complete indifference to the plight of the unemployed and their abandonment of a core American value.

 

Cover Story: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5