"What we've tried to do is have neighbors, colleagues, friends and family talking"
About this Quote
It is never just "talking" in David Plouffe's world. It's routing influence through the most trusted wires people have: the person next door, the coworker you vent to, the cousin who knows your politics before you do. The line is built like a shrug, but it’s a campaign thesis disguised as community spirit. By naming "neighbors, colleagues, friends and family", Plouffe sketches a map of credibility: institutions are noisy, ads are suspect, but your social circle still feels like real life.
The specific intent is organizational, not poetic. Plouffe is describing a strategy that treats persuasion as a chain reaction. If you can seed a message into everyday relationships, you bypass the natural defenses voters raise against political communication. You also make the campaign scalable: one person convinces two, who each convince two more. The message travels without paying for every mile.
The subtext is more interesting: it’s a soft rebuttal to the idea that politics is something done by professionals on TV. Plouffe frames participation as conversation, not mobilization, because "mobilization" sounds like marching orders. "Talking" sounds like agency, like people arrived at their own conclusions. It’s also an early diagnosis of a fractured media environment: when the public square is crowded or distrusted, the kitchen table becomes the most reliable broadcast station.
Contextually, this sits squarely in modern Democratic organizing, especially the Obama-era emphasis on grassroots networks, volunteerism, and peer-to-peer outreach. It’s optimistic in tone, but pragmatic in function: democracy as a contact list.
The specific intent is organizational, not poetic. Plouffe is describing a strategy that treats persuasion as a chain reaction. If you can seed a message into everyday relationships, you bypass the natural defenses voters raise against political communication. You also make the campaign scalable: one person convinces two, who each convince two more. The message travels without paying for every mile.
The subtext is more interesting: it’s a soft rebuttal to the idea that politics is something done by professionals on TV. Plouffe frames participation as conversation, not mobilization, because "mobilization" sounds like marching orders. "Talking" sounds like agency, like people arrived at their own conclusions. It’s also an early diagnosis of a fractured media environment: when the public square is crowded or distrusted, the kitchen table becomes the most reliable broadcast station.
Contextually, this sits squarely in modern Democratic organizing, especially the Obama-era emphasis on grassroots networks, volunteerism, and peer-to-peer outreach. It’s optimistic in tone, but pragmatic in function: democracy as a contact list.
Quote Details
| Topic | Team Building |
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