91Èȱ¬

Organisation v revenge

• Matt Frei
• 8 Nov 06, 12:19 AM

I went to Pennsylvania's 8th congressional district, near Philadelphia, where - the 33-year-old former West Point professor and Iraq veteran - has been running a confident campaign against the Republican incumbent .

"Murph", as his supporters call him, seems to be prevailing over "Fitz", as his supporters call him, in the passion stakes - but once again it looked to me as if the Democrats might founder on the rock of insufficient organisation.

At the Everett primary school in Bristol, Pennsylvania, there were two Republican vote-trackers with bar codes for each voter in hand, keeping an eye on who had actually turned up at the polls.

Those who decided to stay at home had their bar codes processed by a computer for a robo-call to get them off the couch or a knock on the door from a friendly volunteer.

The Democrats had no such trackers and relied, it seemed, mainly on the newfound enthusiasm of their voters. The ground war on Election Day is a battle between organisation and revenge. We will find out in the next few hours which comes out on top.

Matt Frei is the 91Èȱ¬'s senior North America TV correspondent.