Plans for the organization of a support net for Democratic presidential candidate Dick Gephardt have hit a snag.
A Penn for Gephardt introductory meeting last night in the Student Activity Lounge of Houston Hall was intended to attract student interest and line up a plan to increase awareness about Gephardt's campaign goals.
However, low turnout hindered those plans.
Gephardt "has a really compelling message, and we didn't get it out right," event organizer and College sophomore Brian Levy said, adding that Penn for Gephardt plans to come together again in a couple of weeks.
According to College and Wharton sophomore Brett Shaheen -- one of the event's organizers -- five or six people participated in the meeting.
The low attendance was attributed to an insufficient amount of publicity.
"We got a little caught up with midterms, and we couldn't publicize the event as much as we wanted to," Shaheen said.
Levy added that all college halls had been flyered, but the messages were made illegible by other flyers posted over them.
"Dick will never be big on college campuses because he is not about people who spend six hours on the Internet," Levy added.
"He's more about union members and blue-collar workers. He's working against the demographics."
According to Penn College Democrats Vice President David Herman, most campus organizations supporting presidential candidates are just starting to take their first steps, with the noticeable exception of Penn for Dean -- as Howard Dean has managed to attract many college students early on.
"Five people is not bad," Herman said. "It's something to start with. I'm glad they had the number of people they had."
He added that many students have not yet made up their minds as to who they should support.
Levy said that the campus mayoral debate between candidates Sam Katz and John Street last night was also detrimental to the meeting organized in Gephardt's support.
Some students guessed that the low turnout was due to both a lack of publicity and free time.
"Probably a lot of people really didn't care too much, and had other things to do," Engineering junior Karen Rudo said, adding that this is a busy time for many students because of midterms.
Others said the event was worth their time.
"It's an important time to get involved in politics," College junior Justin Hulbert said.
"I'm sure a lot of people are interested in the upcoming elections -- I know I am."
