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"  Last week I got to visit the epicenter of the Obama campaign: the national campaign headquarters in Chicago. The vast office swarms with a couple of hundred twenty- and thirtysomethings, all of them divided into various groups or divisions of responsibility that fit together neatly, like a giant mosaic. Many of the &amp;quot;as seen on TV&amp;quot; chiefs were visible behind glass-walled offices.  Samantha Fennell on the North Fork of Long Island, scouting an event location I would have thought, with all these young folks ensconced in what seemed like acres of cubicles, that it would be chaotic, or even rowdy\u2014but the opposite is true: It hums. It feels like a really big, well-choreographed opera, but there are no divas belting out high notes.  As I heard the staffers like to say, &amp;quot;there&amp;#039;s no drama with Obama.&amp;quot;  Enough with the high-arts similes. Why was I there?   As a volunteer fund-raiser, my purpose was to learn the ins and outs of campaign fund-raising. Last fall, The Chicago Tribune wrote about &amp;quot;Obama University,&amp;quot; a training program designed to educate ordinary citizens on fund-raising practices. While &amp;quot;school&amp;quot; is not in session currently, a crash course of sorts was arranged just for me; I saw and met campaign surrogates, speechwriters, finance heads, and the like.  And thank goodness. I discovered how many rules and laws there are in political fund-raising, not to mention that I was well on my way to breaking about a half a dozen of them\u2014and miss a lot that work in my favor. For example, who would have thought that a case of wine donated from your brand-manager buddy could be misconstrued as a subversive plot for some liquor lobbyist? Or who knew that all of my green-card-carrying Italian and French colleagues who are Obama-obsessed can contribute just as many dollars to the campaign as their American counterparts (although they can&amp;#039;t vote)?  Other notes from the Obama U curriculum: 1) Ask for the money 2) Only ask people who want to contribute to a cause higher than themselves 3) Ask EVERYONE The theory: we are all hard wired with the need to contribute, to make a difference. Even in the most self-centered of us, it&amp;#039;s buried in there somewhere.  However, there is another &amp;quot;genetic&amp;quot; trait that seems to kick in when one is asked for the big bucks. I like to call it the &amp;quot;what&amp;#039;s-in-it-for-me&amp;quot; gene. My prior career in fashion and publishing makes me an expert witness and sometime culprit of this phenomenon.  Let&amp;#039;s face it, when the social season begins and one moves through the annual philanthropic ritual, how many of us six months later can even remember the charity or cause we were supporting? You remember the designer whose name got you there, you remember what you wore, and while you may not readily admit it, you remember whether or not you made it on Patrick McMullan the next day. But you probably do not remember that your contribution (or that of your company buying a table under risk of retribution) may have truly helped women trying to get off welfare, or children with autism, or the rainforests in the Amazon.  All political campaigns are well aware of this\u2014which is why star power is utilized in the form of surrogates for big-ticket fund-raisers and why they are so important to the process: to give donors a reason to turn out beyond the cause. In a strange way, they also help less-politically-motivated donors identify with a candidate. Would you rather hang out with: action star Chuck Norris or film director M. Night Shyamalan (celeb surrogates of the McCain and Obama camps, respectively)? Enough said.  So now, from dialing for dollars in Delaware to scouting event locations in Long Island, I am locked and loaded, ready to raise serious bank for Barack. I just hope that after unlocking the DNA of donating, I will look back six months from now, which will be the month of our next president&amp;#039;s inauguration, and remember that my contribution may have made a small difference.  For more information on how you can get involved, go to www.Barackobama.com "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/culture/career-politics/news/a732/at-the-heart-of-the-obamaverse-3838/>