Obama communications director on VP announcement timing: "Sometimes an email is just an email..."

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In a message entitled "Barack's VP: Be the First to Know," Plouffe writes: "Barack Obama is about to make one of the most important decisions of this campaign -- choosing a running mate."

Plouffe goes on to ask supporters to sign up online (or via text message) in order to be the "first to know" when Obama makes up his mind on his vice presidential nominee.

So, is this a sign that a surprise announcement is in the offing this week even as Obama vacations in Hawaii?

No, according to Obama communications director Dan Pfeiffer. "Sometimes an email is just an email and this one should not be read as some sort of clue on timing of an announcement," he said in an email exchange with The Fix Sunday night.

The more likely goal of the email is to harvest thousands of email addresses and cell phone numbers for the Obama campaign. The more ways the campaign has to contact supporters or potential supporters, the better chance it has of maximizing its vote in the fall.

But, the email should serve as a reminder that a vice presidential decision from either Obama or John McCain could come any day between now and the end of the month.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/2008/08/obama_n...

More "who will Obama pick and when" parlour game fun with Al Giordano --

Text Messages and Tea Leaves
Posted by Al Giordano - August 10, 2008 at 10:10 pm By Al Giordano



What can be read into two moves by the Obama campaign today regarding the pending pick of a vice presidential nominee?

The whole world has been invited to "be the first to know" when the VP choice is announced, via text message to every cell phone that requests it (and, reading the missive carefully, the news will move simultaneously via email to the millions already on the campaign's list).

The news came in a mass email from campaign manager David Plouffe:

You will receive an email the moment Barack makes his decision, or you can text VP to 62262 to receive a text message on your mobile phone.

Once you've signed up, please forward this email to your friends, family, and coworkers to let them know about this special opportunity.

No other campaign has done this before. You can be part of this important moment.

To pull this off, they'll have to throw the national media off the scent of the real choice (perhaps they'll do as Kerry's people did four years ago and "leak" a decoy choice to one of Rupert Murdoch's media outlets: I'm cool with that... as long as it's not The Field!).

Most likely, the decision to drop the news from the bottom up and horizontally, bypassing the middlemen of the media, reflects a confidence that the person chosen will be satisfactory to the grassroots supporters.

Or - an alternate and opposite reading might suggest - that if it is a tooth-puller of a choice (i.e. a Bayh, a Biden, or a Clinton) it will be even more vital to deliver the talking points and arguments in favor of that person to the supporters on the ground.

But more likely this reflects the former: in which he or she will either be an outside-of-the-beltway (Kaine, Sebelius, Schweitzer, Richardson, etcetera) change agent, or someone inside Washington that would nonetheless excite the Internet bases of Obama supporters (i.e. Dodd).

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http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/text-messages...