The Orbis

It apparently started out as an idea proposed over a drink in a London Pub to provide a somewhat light-hearted and unorthodox way for non-Americans to get involved in this year’s presidential election. It eventually generated editorials in the Washington Post and the New York Times, as well as being the focus of an entire show by Rush Limbaugh and becoming the target of a series of Republican bloggers.

The issue in question was the campaign launched by The Guardian, the major liberal newspaper in Britain, which they entitled “Operation Clark County.” The idea was to provide readers of The Guardian with the name and address of a registered voter in Clark County, Ohio, to whom they would then write, urging that voter to support John Kerry in the upcoming election.

Clark County had been selected as it is one of the most marginal counties in one of the most critical swing states. Those wanting to write the letters were advised to be careful and moderate in their language, and to “imagine how they would feel receiving such a letter ahead of a U.K. election.” Within 24 hours, more than 4,000 people visited The Guardian’s website to request an address. By the time the site had been disabled by a hacker a few days later, 14,000 people had signed up to write to Clark County.

Many of the letters that were sent were highly personal in character, often drawing on the writer’s own experience of the United States. One letter from a reader in Wales spoke of his time as a cartographer in the United States that allowed him even now to close his eyes and “see the lakes and woods and mountains of your beautiful nation.”

But while obviously intended seriously, the campaign had been launched in the newspaper’s ìG2î supplement with a firmly tongue-in-cheek tone as to its likely impact. They certainly had not expected their reporters in China to be asked about it, or to have enquiries from CNN as to what they were trying to do.

However, as the letters started to come in, the Clark County Springfield News Sun put the story on its front page. Soon after that, right-wing bloggers, such as the aptly named “spleenville,” started to bombard Guardian staff with e-mails. They went so far as to urge American conservatives to sign up for the names themselves, to prevent them falling into the hands of nefarious Brits.

Guardian journalists said they were not surprised that there should be some negative reaction; after all, who likes being told what to do by someone else? But the vindictiveness of the backlash kept the story in the news for over a week. Responses to the letter-writing included several that began with “Dear Limey Assholes,” or “Hey, tea-sipping pinkos” and deteriorated from there.

One person wrote a journalist, “I hope your ear holes turn to assholes and shit on your shoulders.” Another urged The Guardian to “Go fix your backsliding socialist country, and keep your snooty, has-been noses out of our affairs.” One correspondent even somberly warned the staff, “As a U.S. citizen, I want to advise you that you and anyone that participates in subverting the U.S. presidential election can be criminally charged and perhaps even charged as spies.”

But while the backlash was outspoken and direct, it was also arguably counter-productive. At FOX, Rush Limbaugh and others covered critical reaction to the campaign, the story became more widely known, and soon there were people signing up from all round the world: Norway, South Africa, Australia, Japan, France and many others.

The vitriol hurled at the newspaper was also almost exclusively from people outside of Clark County. There were also several responses from those in Ohio who had received letters, and while many of these were un-persuaded, there were few complaints about the very idea behind it. Said one Bush supporting resident about her letter, “It caught me off guard, but it was very nicely written.”

The campaign has also attracted several more good-natured responses suggesting it may be counter-productive.

The spokesperson for the Bush-Cheney campaign in Clark County dryly remarked that he welcomed all contributions to the election, and hoped these would prove as popular as “the last time the Brits tried to persuade us to do anything,” in around 1776.

The letter-writing campaign has now died down, and, in all likelihood, had no impact whatsoever on anyone’s vote. But the reactions and enthusiasm that it sparked were remarkable, and even with the British Empire long departed, it has perhaps made Clark County “some corner of a foreign field” that is forever being written to by England.

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