Obama campaign: Do six hours of "volunteer" work before Friday or no tickets to Invesco Field speech

And even doing the work doesn't guarantee anything. Westword:

Last week’s public announcement and the language on the online application [for tickets to Barack Obama's nomination acceptance speech at Invesco Field August 28] promised that you didn’t have to be an Obama supporter or even a Democrat to score "community credentials," but that those who volunteered would be in the running for better seats. So, being the independent I am, I did not check the box indicating I’d be willing to volunteer. My friend did, and the message she received implied that tickets would only be going to the first people to finish their volunteer duties. It was so convincing that she went straight to her local Campaign for Change office last night to get her first three hours in. Everybody she talked to was also a first-time volunteer, hoping to earn an Invesco ticket. Clever campaigning.

Demanding six hours of work before Friday is clever campaigning? Seems more like hubris to me, and likely to piss people off. Here's audio of the phone message.

Incidentally, I didn't check the "willing to volunteer" box either. After all, I'm not. Haven't heard about my ticket yet.

Update: So what do out-of-staters have to do? Barack's laundry?

Update II: I was right: hubris. The Rocky:

Some of those hoping to wrangle a seat for Barack Obama's speech were told this week they have to put in six hours of volunteer work for his campaign by Friday to have a shot at a ticket.

And that ruffled at least a few feathers.

"My whole reason why I'm so mad about it is because Democrats need to act like Democrats," said Heather Kreider, a working mother from Centennial.

"Democrats work for a living [Republicans, of course, hang out on street corners], and they have to work and take care of their families. And they say these are open to those in the community, so they shouldn't ask people to drop everything in their lives for this," Kreider said Tuesday.

"It's not fair. It's elitist. And they need to practice what they're preaching," she added.

You know, Kreider, you'd be better off just doing your work rather than standing around bitching all the time.

Kreider was among more than 80,000 people who applied for tickets to Obama's Aug. 28 speech accepting his party's presidential nomination. As part of the application process, people were asked to check a box if they were willing to volunteer for the Obama campaign.

Matt Chandler, a spokesman for the Obama campaign, said the only people who were asked to volunteer were those who said on their applications that they were willing to do the work. . . .

But Kreider said she is certain she didn't hit the "volunteer" box on the online application.

Still, Kreider got a message telling her that she had to do six hours of volunteer work by Friday if she wanted a chance at a ticket. Kreider said she will not do the work.

"Absolutely not," she said. "Now it's pure principal. I was a Hillary Clinton supporter, and this is literally my first touch with the Obama campaign. And it's just disappointing."

"A man" is pissed, too:

A man, who spoke to the Rocky on the condition that he not be named, said he got a message saying he had to do 12 hours of phone work or canvassing to have a chance at the two tickets he wants.

Asked if he planned to do the work, he said "hell no" and called the campaign's conditions "blackmail."

"Blackmail." Not a racist word.

More: Here I am going on and on about relative krep while they find some dead guy in a Denver hotel room in possession of a large quantity of possible cyanide and perhaps having written crazy notes (while he was alive, of course). Snapple kept telling me about it and I ignored her. That's what I get.

Update: The Post just a few minutes ago: "No terrorist link found in cyanide case." We'll see.

More:

An e-mail sent from the political director of the Colorado Democratic Party threatened the status of a national delegate, alleging she made "disparaging public remarks" about Sen. Barack Obama.

Sacha Millstone of Boulder said that her comments were critical, but they were not public.

Millstone acknowledged she was frustrated over how the Obama campaign was treating delegates who supported Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and told a fellow delegate, in what she believed was a private e-mail exchange, that she was not sure she could vote for Obama at the Democratic National Convention later this month.

The other delegate apparently filed a complaint with the state Democratic Party suggesting Millstone lose her status as a delegate.

(h/t Hazardous T)