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— Viewed by millions, comedian Sarah Silverman's humorous, profanity-strewn plea for young Jews to persuade their grandparents to vote for Barack Obama is an Internet sensation. Can it turn laughs into votes in swing states like Florida?
The project called "The Great Schlep" — the Yiddish word means to move with effort or drag oneself — formally launched over the weekend, though the video has been online longer. It challenges viewers to visit their grandparents in Florida and elsewhere and ensure they do as most Jews long have — vote Democratic.
The comic turn is also intended to combat rumors that Obama, a Christian who professes "an unshakable commitment" to Israel's security, is secretly a Muslim and anti-Israel.
If Obama doesn't win, Silverman says in the video, she'll blame Jews.
"I know you're saying, like, 'Oh, my God, Sarah, I can't believe you're saying this. Jews are the most liberal, scrappy, civil-rightsy people there are,'" she says. "Yes, that's true, but you're forgetting a whole large group of Jews that are not that way and they go by several aliases: Nana, Papa, Zadie, Bubbie, plain old Grandma and Grandpa. These are the people that vote in Florida and the Florida vote can make or break an election."
That was certainly true in 2000 when Republican George W. Bush won Florida, and the election, by a 537-vote margin. Bush won Florida again in 2004, and the state's 27 electoral votes are crucial to Republican John McCain's campaign against Obama.
Mik Moore, a co-creator of the project, estimated about 100 people traveled to Florida over the weekend, and about 100 others went to other states, though because it's largely a grass-roots effort he said it was difficult to quantify.
"For every grandparent that changes their mind they're now in a position to talk to their friends, their neighbors," Moore said. "And the likelihood about them having that conversation is really high because they're talking about their grandchild coming to visit them."
Cobin Dopkeen, a 20-year-old student at Tufts University, visited his aunt and grandparents in Miami over the weekend, though all were already Obama supporters, so he didn't have much of a task on his hands.
But Dopkeen said he hoped to change the minds of friends and neighbors of his family.
"I got down there and it turns out a lot of older people do already support Obama," he said. "But I found an undecided voter that I managed to convince to vote for Obama."
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On the Net:
"The Great Schlep": http://www.thegreatschlep.com/site/index.html
