I just got off a conference call with Barack Obama’s Campaign Manager

I got on a few minutes late but here is the gist:

The block quote his not verbatim, but the sense of what was being said as best as I could get it down.

David Plouffe: (The campaign in Delaware) is the kind of grassroots movement that is happening in the rest of the country for Obama. 1,000’s of doors have been knocked on here. Michele Obama coming in and a paid staff, but a paid staff is just in place to help organize the existing networks.

In Delaware Obama is also blessed to have strong political support. Markell, Carney, Matt Denn, Ted Blunt all helping to get the word out and providing strong support to the volunteer effort.

Delaware is going to be an important state. This is a historic kind of election and every delegate is going to count. Delaware should be good for Obama since he has done very well in both rural and urban areas of Iowa, SC and Nevada. Which speaks to Obama’s broad appeal.

Obama will be a much stronger general election candidate. He will put many more states in play. He was the most requested speaker for Dems running in Red and purple states last election. He will break down the Red/blue stagnation that has set in (Un-spoken but clearly he was talking about Clinton)

Therefore he will help down ballot candidates There will not be a Democratic “no fly zone.” (Again. Unspoken was the second part – “as there might be with another potential democratic nominee.” Clinton will keep the politics of division going.)

Big down ticket Democratic victories are important because what has to happen after the election. We can’t have the continuing armed camps approach with a fractured country (that Clinton would continue)

The first question was from somebody at WILM: I forget what he asked.

Then I got to ask a question: “This is Jason Scott form Delaware Liberal…How do you see the Feb 5^th map breaking down? Where is Obama strong and where does he have to do better that anticipated?”

We are running hard everywhere. We are not cherry picking some states and saying we can win here but not here. Everyplace with delegates is important. This could be a situation where we get through February and it is not yet clear. We plan on getting delegates in even in NY Mrs. Clinton’s home state, and those delegates will matter.

Then Randall Chase form Associated Press asked a question: “You said that Obama will do well with independents and moderate Republicans. Do you see the Ted Kennedy endorsement chasing some of those people away?”

“No.” There was some expaination but basically he just said no.

Then Celia asked a question, and this is funny – she had to banter a bit with the Campaign Director “This is Celia Cohen from Delaware Grapevine. Hi David How are you? It has been a while.”

Sheesh. Such an insider. Celia why do you have to be such a parody of youself?

Anyway her question was actually surprisingly good.

“Will Joe Biden’s name still appearing on the ballot affect anything?’

I don’t think so. We think 97% of the vote will be split between people still in the race.

That was pretty much it.