C'mon, Jeff Mapes, tell me you're not that gullible.
Kari Chisholm
So, over at his excellent new blog - Mapes on Politics - the Oregonian's top political reporter, Jeff Mapes, talks about Howard Dean's appearance in Portland tonight.
(And here's your promotional moment: Howard Dean. Tonight. 6 p.m. Benson Hotel. Fifty bucks. $25 with student i.d.)
Mapes notes that Governor Dean is really hot to remove Senator Gordon Smith from office. Quoting Mapes, who quotes Dean:
Not surprisingly, Dean has a new rap on Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., portraying him as a West Coast version of Rhode Island's Lincoln Chafee. Like Smith, Chafee was a personally well-liked Republican senator willing to cross party lines. But Chafee got caught in the Democratic wave in 2006 and went down to defeat. Dean said:Gordon Smith has enabled the [Republican] minority in the Senate by supporting [GOP Senate Leader] Mitch McConnell to kill our ability to get out of Iraq and veto SCHIP [State Children's Health Insurance Program].He may not be doing that himself, but he is enabling that just like Lincoln Chafee did, and our case to the voters of Oregon is going to be, 'If you want to get out of Iraq, you've got to have a new senator because your senator is supporting a minority who kills our ability to do that.
Well, Smith would argue that. He did vote with the Democratic majority on withdrawing troops from Iraq and on expanding the children's health program. But Smith does indeed stick with McConnell on many issues and he makes a tempting target for Democrats looking to pad their slim majority in the Senate.
Wait, let's check that last paragraph one more time. One more time, cue Mapes:
Well, Smith would argue that. He did vote with the Democratic majority on withdrawing troops from Iraq...
Wrong, Jeff. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Even if you set aside his vote to authorize the war, and his many votes to fund the war, and his over-the-top rhetoric in defending the war, and just look at his votes AFTER his the-war-might-be-criminal speech... here's the box score for 2007:
May 16, 2007. Gordon Smith votes against cloture on a bill to bring the troops home by March 31, 2008.
May 24, 2007. Gordon Smith votes in favor of fully funding the Iraq War.
September 20, 2007. Gordon Smith votes against a bill to bring the troops home by June 2008 by limiting funds to noncombat operations.
October 3, 2007. Gordon Smith voted against the Feingold/Reid bill to cut off war funding by June 2008.
For the record, Senator Ron Wyden was on the opposite side of every one of these votes.
Seriously, Jeff. Don't get head-faked by Gordon Smith's spin moves. A rookie reporter for a minor paper, maybe, but you're a better journalist than that.
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12:45 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Let's not forget his bad record on veteran's benefits either.
Oct 22, '07
But on one of the biggest votes of the last decade, Wyden and Smith were in lockstep with the interests of multinational corporations when they both cast votes in favor of CAFTA. In the end, they both are bought and paid for by the biggest money-men in the Country. Sure, Wyden is expected to cast more liberal votes, but he is the best Senator (after Gordon Smith) that big business can buy in a blue state.
As far as I see it, working families in Oregon could use two new Senators. Ones with a set of priorities that are in the public interest, not the private.
2:16 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Somehow I expected the comment thread to be longer here. This seems like a slightly controversial point Kari makes, but maybe everyone on the lefty side (read: BlueOregon readers) now agrees that he's a conservative in Mark Hatfield's ill-fitting "maverick" clothing.
2:36 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
And Smith really is nothing like Lincoln Chafee, who may well have been the last of the truly liberal NE Republicans, i.e. not a moderate like the Senators from Maine, but an honest-to-god liberal like Lowell Weicker or Jacob Javits or his father, John Chafee. Cross-voting Rhode Islanders had a much harder choice.
The vote I most regret casting in my life was voting for Joe Lieberman over Lowell Weicker in 1988, on essentially partisan grounds (Weicker was running the RSCC that year). I was misled about Lieberman's overall politics by some strong pro-labor actions as CT Attorney General. Sometimes the partisan considerations should take a back seat.
But Oregon 2008 isn't one of them. Smith is a fake even as a moderate, deliberately so. Both Steve Novick and Jeff Merkley would make incomparably better senators. A fire hydrant that caucused with the Democrats would be preferable.
2:38 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Jeff,
I don't see where Kari is making the point that Smith is as you described. What I got from the post is that Mapes, not Kari, was trying to make that point about Smith. All I see Kari doing is rightly correcting Jeff Mapes' "facts".
2:46 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
I'm no fan of Gordon Smith, but you should be honest here and acknowledge that:
1) A plurality or majority of Democrats in the U.S. Senate voted the same way Smith did on the war bills you describe and
2) Smith played a major role in setting up the funding plan for SCHIP.
Mapes had it about right on that portion of Smith's record, and in ny case, he was characterizing the case that Smith is going to make, not necessarily agreeing with it.
2:49 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Chris,
Excellent point about Chafee. I very much agree and was personally disappointed when Chafee was defeated. I liked him.
I've got a cyber friend in CT who happens to also be named Chris. He's a paleo-conservative, but decidedly of the Independent persuasion (our common ground with each other), and a huge Pat Buchanan fan. But first and foremost he's very strongly pro-labor. Surprisingly so for a Buchanan fan, IMO. He fought side-by-side with progressives to help Ned Lamont defeat Lieberman and again fought with progressives during the general election, but to no avail.
3:25 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Kevin--they're opposite ends of the same telescope. Put another way, everyone apparently takes Mapes' view to be bogus, so there's no controversy there. I dunno, I guess this just seems like a controversial post, but my takeaway is that for this readership, not so much.
3:42 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Jeff,
So you're basically saying the same thing as Sal?
I dunno... I see your point and it is valid. But Kari's criticism was strictly on the issue of whether Smith has voted with the Dems on Iraq, as Mapes claimed.
Of course, just like everyone else, I bring my own prejudices and experience to this issue. As you may have noticed, I have previously pointed out in comments here that to date I've never voted against Smith. Yes, I definitely did see him as a moderate. But I was a HUGE fan of Hatfield's and at no point did I ever consider Smith to be in Hatfield's mold by any stretch of the imagination. I actually considered him much more like Packwood than Hatfield.
During the whole of the 90's I consistently voted for candidates that I perceived as moderates and I consistently favored moderate Republicans over moderate Democrats. An example would be my preferring Molly Bordenaro (or however her last name is spelled) over David Wu when he won the seat for the first time.
That was then and this is now. I have different views today. But back then that's how I saw things.
Having admitted my bias and voting history... it is my considered opinion that the criticism of Senator Smith as a conservative in a moderate's clothing is in general accurate and fair.
Oct 22, '07
First of all, thanks to John Calhoun for the first comment. It is all well and good to talk about energy, the environment, and the Iraq war generally. Those are very popular issues with Democrats. But when will we hear our Senate candidates talking about veterans issues? Last time I looked, Jeff had nothing on his site about veterans, Steve had a concluding line in the "prioritized defense spending" section something like "and we must not forget to take care of veterans".
Discussion of how well the Dole-Shalala Wounded Warrior Comm. 6 proposals are being implemented shouldn't be that difficult. But it might require some research.
Have the campaigns even researched Gordon's voting record on veterans? Whether or not he voted yes on the Webb amendment (why is allowing troops sufficient time at home "a way to change Bush Iraq policy"--the GOP spin--and not the true meaning of "support the troops"?), there are a lot of veterans and family and friends of veterans in Oregon. To show their political diversity, think about the difference in politics of Iraq veterans Paul Evans (former Democratic state senate candidate) and St. Rep. Brian Boquist. And yet it was Republican Boquist who gave that 2007 speech in favor of HJM 9 where (among other strong words--wish I could find the text of it somewhere) he said "support the troops" did not mean car magnets and rhetoric, it meant material support. The examples he gave were things like vehicles matched to mission (not wide vehicles to patrol narrow streets) and "hot meals with cold drinks".
As the title suggests, I believe Jeff Mapes is that gullible. I recall his coverage of the 1996 US Senate primary where he appeared to accept without question the press/DSCC party line of "Bruggere is the choice, why talk about anyone else in the primary?". The other candidates talked issues, but Bruggere was allowed to get away with "Bruggere had no detailed views on the issue" in news profiles. Yes, Jeff and Steve are both too smart to do that. But will the press talk about issues unless forced to by the candidates?
I have not yet made up my mind in this primary--have known both candidates since before they declared and have respect for John Frohnmayer after reading his book. (Warning to Jeff and Steve's partisans: if you say any version of "even admiring John Frohnmayer's book publicly is like a vote for Gordon Smith", you will be giving me a reason not to vote for your candidate.)
What I want to avoid at all costs is a rerun of that uninspiring, obnoxious, brainless 1996 primary. Jeff Merkley actually got himself elected to office and is not like Bruggere. Steve is a very bright guy who does a good job on Q&A (when I saw him the Q & A was even better than the speech) who sometimes seems like he's still being a consultant and writing one-liners for someone else. Some of his one-liners seem aimed at highly partisan activist audiences and not like they would attract either independents or people who may not be Democratic activists. And no one wins a general election, much less a primary, by only viewing the party faithful who have volunteered in multiple elections as their target audience.
A lot of people really landed on Dick Hughes and the SJ editorial brainlessly opposing Measure 49. Especially having read the LO interview with Howard Dean where he talks about DNC officers being scrupulously neutral in primary elections, I believe one way to have an intelligent US Senate primary next year is to land like a ton of bricks on anyone who buys into the "DSCC has spoken, how dare anyone question their wisdom?" mentality shown in another entry on the Mapes blog.
Here is a quote from it. If you believe that the primary should be a debate on issues with Oregonians deciding who to choose in the primary--- and not the DSCC and the Washington press corp telling Oregonians the DSCC has made a decision and they are just supposed to follow orders, let Mapes, the Wash. Post guy, and anyone who parrots their ideas know exactly what you think of them.
By now, it's no surprise that Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post pegs the Oregon Senate race as the 6th most likely to switch parties in the country. But Cillizza, in his "The Fix" blog, clearly can't quite decide if Republican incumbent Gordon Smith is in real trouble or not.
"We're of two minds on this race. On the one hand, rumors of a Democratic poll that shows Sen. Gordon Smith's (R) re-elect score in the toilet continue to -- ahem -- swirl. National Democratic strategists, who have been down this road before, insist that Smith's numbers at this point in the cycle closely resemble those of the Senate GOP incumbents who lost last year. On the other, state Rep. Jeff Merkley hasn't impressed to date; his $294,000 raised in the third quarter wasn't what we had expected given the amount of establishment support that has coalesced behind him quickly. And liberal activist Steve Novick continues to hang around (he ended September with $7,000 more in the bank than Merkley) and promises to distract Merkley from turning his full attention on Smith. Still, this is a Democratic-leaning state made more so by the war in Iraq and the related animosity toward President Bush. Smith, an able politician, must find a way to avoid paying the price for those feelings.
4:11 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Smith is a problem for the general reason that Dean describes -- he's part of the wrong caucus, and we live in an era of strong caucuses -- much to our detriment.
But Dean is wrong to criticize Smith specifically on SCHIP -- most of the Democrats who backed the measure agree that Smith played an important role in setting up the financing plan for the proposal that the President vetoed, and the simple fact of the matter is that a plurality or majority of Democrats voted the same way Smith did on the war bills that were discussed.
My point is not that this makes Smith a solid vote on the war. Rather, my point is that about half of the democrats in the Senate, including most of the players in the DSCC, can't be trusted any more than Gordon can to vote the right way on the war.
John Frohnmayer's point, which I happen to agree with, is that we have no way of knowing whether or not Smith is sincere on his reversal on the war, but that 4 years is too long to wait for someone to come around on a war that was ill-considered to begin with.
Oct 22, '07
LT:
Veterans For Merkley
has been on Jeff Merkley's site since August 27th. Veterans such as Tony McPeak, Jim Rassman, and Paul Evans vowed their support for Jeff. It also describes some of the veteran's bills Speaker Merkley shepherded through the legislature.
Oct 22, '07
sorry messed up the link.
Veterans For Merkley
Oct 22, '07
Kevin, great comment(although I never saw Molly B. in the mold of famous moderate Republican women like Mary Alice Ford, Nancy Ryles, Norma Paulus, Mary Burrows, or even Delna Jones).
Great observation about Packwood. One of my all time favorite Steve Duin lines was about Packwood:
"When you are trying to nail down Bob Packwood, you will find him greasing the handle of your hammer".
Oct 22, '07
OK, jraad. I knew about the endorsements. And this comment
"With his support for the Bush policy in Iraq, Gordon Smith has failed Oregon and he has failed America's veterans," Merkley said. "Our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines show real leadership every single day. They deserve nothing less in a United States Senator."
shows he has something on his website about veterans. If someone went to the home page for Merkley's campaign, is there a link from the home page to Veterans for Merkley? I don't recall seeing it.
The "real leadership" in the quote should mean more than a talking point. I have met some of the veterans who made the endorsements, and one of them is a friend.
But I still think it would be nice to hear our US Senate candidates actually TALK in public on veterans issues:
*red tape, how counties and the state of Oregon help vets, if there any sort of veterans facility E. of the Cascades, if the help (incl. employment help) which appears on paper to be for vets is actually being delivered (a vet I know had trouble with that)
*the Walter Reed et al scandal which led to the Dole-Shalala Wounded Warrior Commission
*the Webb amendment about giving troops the same amount of time at home as deployed
*the role of active duty military, Guard and Reserve
*the role of contractors
*problems with military retention
*the scandal about benefits for the Minn. National Guard unit deployed longer than any other unit, but when they got home some of the troops found their orders said 729 days, others 730 days, and 730 days is the minimum for the full benefit package.
Other important issues are being discussed, but this election cycle we seriously need to discuss these veterans issues. If Boquist could touch on these issues in his HJM 9 speech, there is no reason we can't hear about these issues in more depth from US Senate candidates than the above quote.
All the US Senate candidates should have VETERANS as a subtitle on their issues page. I've been involved in lobbying veterans issues for a couple of decades, and apathy (the topic being ignored) has always been a problem.
8:52 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
Uh, check your facts, Sal.
Feingold Amendment, 5/15/07... 28 of 49 Dems vote Yea.
Feingold Amendment, 9/20/07...27 of 49 Dems vote Yea.
Feingold Amendment, 10/03/07...27 of 49 Dems vote Yea.
That's a majority of Democrats voting OPPOSITE of Smith on three of the four bills Kari cites.
Oct 22, '07
LT: I completely agree that the issues you mentioned are very important. I would add the expansion of the G.I. bill, considering the raise in tuition over the years.
I just didn't want to let it pass by that the Speaker had no mention of Veterans on his site.
9:49 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
On 3 of the votes mentioned, a plurality of Democrats -- 40 percent -- voted the same way that Smith did and on the 4th, a majority voted the same way that he did.
Your post does not contradict my statement, if confirms it.
Oct 22, '07
I just didn't want to let it pass by that the Speaker had no mention of Veterans on his site.
That's fine. Just go to http://www.jeffmerkley.com/ pretend you have never been to the site before, and see how long it takes you to find the statement you quoted.
Hint: it is not under issues, it is under endorsements. ISSUES is pretty thin gruel so far compared to Steve's site.
That is what I was saying. As I said, I remembered the endorsements because I admire all those vets, have met 2, and am a friend of one.
11:57 p.m.
Oct 22, '07
a plurality of Democrats -- 40 percent
what? A plurality is simply the largest non-majority share, not any specific number. It's typically an inter-group statistic (Dem, GOP, Ind) and not an intragroup one (12 of 20 Dems, 8 of 19 GOP), because it means biggest pile among more than two piles, when no pile is at least 50%.
That explains the discrepancy, at least.
12:05 a.m.
Oct 23, '07
Hint: it is not under issues, it is under endorsements.
Good catch, LT. That's fixed now.
7:01 a.m.
Oct 23, '07
Hey, thanks for the correction. Doesn't change my point, though. We've still got 40 percent of D's in the Senate who are as unreliable as Smith is on the war.
10:12 a.m.
Oct 23, '07
So, because there's a bunch of dumb Democrats floating around somewhere east of Hells Canyon - Oregonians should excuse Gordon Smith's votes?
10:42 a.m.
Oct 23, '07
"Hey, thanks for the correction. Doesn't change my point, though. We've still got 40 percent of D's in the Senate who are as unreliable as Smith is on the war."
On that, I'm with you 100%. We don't need more Democrats so much as we need BETTER ones.
10:44 a.m.
Oct 23, '07
oh, and if I may, since this is the Howard Dean appearance thread...
Like Kari, I did a short interview with Howard on Friday; the entire text of his responses is here.
Nothstine, our new featured author at LO, went to the event and recorded pretty much the whole dadblamed thing, in three parts for your listening convenience.
11:34 a.m.
Oct 23, '07
We don't need more Democrats so much as we need BETTER ones.
True, but any Democrat is better than a Republican.
1:21 p.m.
Oct 23, '07
So, because there's a bunch of dumb Democrats floating around somewhere east of Hells Canyon - Oregonians should excuse Gordon Smith's votes?
No. I'm saying that Mapes basically has it right with regard to how Smith will characterize his record.
I don't think that it's credible to criticize Gordon Smith on SCHIP, given that he was the prime mover on setting up the funding mechanism for that program.
I'm also saying that if you want to criticize Smith's recent votes on war funding, then you should also be willing to make the same criticism of Democrats who are voting the wrong way on the war -- including many of the Presidential candidates who didn't start voting the right way on the war until after they decided to run for President.
Also, I think it's totally disingenuous to say that these are just "dumb Democrats floating around somewhere east of Hell's Canyon".
These are US Senators who are among the most powerful Democrats in the country, and many of them were elected on a platform of ending the war, holding the administration accountable, etc.
1:24 p.m.
Oct 23, '07
True, but any Democrat is better than a Republican.
OY???
Senator Lieberman was better than Senator Chafee??? How do you figure? There are any number of Dixiecrats that I would choose a moderate/liberal Republican over any day of the week and twice on Sundays!
Oct 23, '07
Just realized why I can't get excited by the Democratic candidates for US Senate.
Very bright candidates, with their own assets and liabilities. But the websites are kind of vague, with stories of what they have been doing lately, issue statements slightly longer than sound bites, not much that is very inspiring.
Some of the debate here is on topics like whether any Democrat is better than any Republican. That is going to help one candidate defeat the other? That is going to help advocates say, for instance, Steve is better than Jeff on the issue of....?
Why the problem with details?
After reading this:
Posted by: Kari Chisholm | Oct 23, 2007 12:05:10 AM
Hint: it is not under issues, it is under endorsements.
Good catch, LT. That's fixed now.
I went to the Merkley website, and saw the endorsement with Gary Hart's picture and quote. I'm a big fan of Gary--was one of his 1984 delegates and have talked to him in person a couple of times. THAT was an inspiring campaign, and those of us who worked on it stayed friends for years --it was one of those friends who told me when Gary came to World Affairs Council so I could get tickets and arrange to go to Portland with someone to see him speak.
I was the local Hart volunteer coordinator for my area in 1984. Maybe I was spoiled by that campaign when it comes to serious discussion of issues.
Even if I may not be impressed with all of Steve's issue positions (like putting veterans under Prioritized Defense Spending), at least he lists the issues and has paragraphs for each, rather than Jeff's issue page which has links with names like "Change is coming" and if you click on the link you get substance. I'm glad he was a successful Speaker, but that is of interest to people looking for an alternative to Gordon because........?
There is a quote from Gary Hart which says "Jeff Merkley has a plan for Iraq which has these parts..."
That seems like an important issue, why not an article on the home page saying "Merkley's plan for Iraq" and then bullet points from the paragraph where Hart is naming off the points?
For those who don't know, Hart wasn't supposed to do well in Oregon--got started late, most of the establishment were for Mondale, many of the people on the campaign had little or no political experience. Except we got 59% of the primary vote, making it possible for people like me to be delegates.
We had a friend of the Hart family who was living in Oregon running the campaign, and many of Gary's supporters were active because they liked where he stood on an issue.
One of his issues was better treatment of veterans. There was a bill he originally introduced in about 1976 at the request of Colorado Vietnam Vets of America called Judicial Review of Veterans Claims. It had to do with appeal rights if veterans were stuck in red tape nightmares or had been denied benefits for obvious war wounds (shrapnel in the lungs, for instance).
It finally passed in 1988 as part of the bill creating the Veterans cabinet dept. Danny Boy Quayle made a fool of himself some weeks after he was nominated VP by answering a question at a veterans convention about his no vote on the bill by saying "it was a youthful indescretion" and Lloyd Bentsen reminded him how many weeks/months previously the vote had taken place.
There was a letter to the editor in the SJ today about a specific piece of legislation Cong. Hooley is involved with.
Hooley an advocate for U.S. veterans October 23, 2007 Darlene Hooley is truly for the veterans of this country. She is a co-sponsor of H.R. 333, which will let veterans less than 50 percent disabled who retire from the military collect VA compensation and military retirement concurrently. I'm a disabled veteran with over 29 years' military service and a disabled retired postal worker and have enough credits for social security. I can't collect full Social Security because I'm a retired postal worker. But I hope I'll be able to collect both VA compensation and military retirement concurrently. We need more people like Hooley in Congress who care for our veterans. She has done a lot for our veterans.
http://www.statesmanjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071023/OPINION/710230307/1050
Is the author of that letter a voter either candidate would like to have as a supporter? Or are other issues more important?
I know it is early--only 2007. But now is the time to be building infrastructure, incl. issue positions. If someone came to the event of one of the candidates and asked "Where do you stand on H.R. 333 which Cong. Darlene Hooley co-sponsored", would either candidate know how to answer? Agree or disagree, it would be nice for our US Senate candidates to have a public statement on that issue.
My impression from a distance is that we have 2 very intelligent candidates saying they are the answer to defeating Gordon Smith, but people should sign up to help their campaign before they have detailed issue positions. I'll wait until there is more substance.
10:14 p.m.
Oct 23, '07
Any Democrat is better than any Republican because of the first vote they cast -- for control of the body; via the majority leader and the chairs of the committees.
Lincoln Chaffee (and Gordon Smith) voted to put Mitch McConnell in charge.
I suggest reading the book by Markos and Jerome, Crashing the Gates. There's an entire chapter in there about Linc Chaffee -- and campaign like his.
This is best illustrated by picking a specific issue. Let's assume that the right-to-choose is the most important issue in the whole world to you. You're a single issue voter.
What's better? A pro-choice Republican that puts the anti-choice Republican majority in power? Or an anti-choice Democrat that puts a pro-choice Democratic majority in power?
I choose the latter. Like Markos, I choose control of the legislative body. It's not about supporting a pro-life Democrat - it's about supporting a pro-choice Democratic majority.
Again, this question isn't about choice - but it's an issue with two hardened sides, so it helps illustrate the point.
Any Democrat is better than any Republican, even if they're worse on specific issues.
10:21 p.m.
Oct 23, '07
LT... don't worry about the issue content. It's all coming. There's still six months before ballots are due. Hang in there.
I should note that it's not really fair to compare a pre-Internet campaign to a modern campaign. Your notion of "a campaign that talked about issues" is entirely based on what you saw of Gary Hart in person. He didn't have any issue content on his website; because he didn't have a website.
Our expectations have changed. In 1992, Bill Clinton ran a campaign in New Hampshire that argued, "This year, specificity on the issues is a character issue." And the sum total of that specificity? An eight-page "Plan for America". Today, we'd laugh out loud at that. Today, we expect pages and pages of policy content online - why? Because we can.
I daresay that if you saw either Jeff Merkley or Steve Novick in person, you'd hear just as much issue content in person as you did with Gary Hart in 1984.
But both campaigns are busily building grassroots organizations, raising money, and putting together the infrastructure. All campaigns work from the inside circle of supporters outward - eventually talking to voters just prior to balloting. By then, both campaigns will be loaded for bear. Right now, they're both working real hard to organize the folks that already know them.
Hang in there. It's all going to be OK.
10:25 p.m.
Oct 23, '07
I'm also saying that if you want to criticize Smith's recent votes on war funding, then you should also be willing to make the same criticism of Democrats who are voting the wrong way on the war
Sure, fine. I'm happy to criticize 'em. But this is BlueOregon, and we're all voters in Oregon. We talk about Gordon Smith and Ron Wyden.
If you want to spend your time yammering about Joe Lieberman, go to My Left Nutmeg. If you want to spend your time yammering about Ben Nelson, go to New Nebraska.
10:34 p.m.
Oct 23, '07
Spoken like a true partisan, Kari.
I spent a couple of hours with Norma Paulus last week, and I would take a Republican like her over half of the Democrats currently in the US Senate.
Fighting the extremism of the Republican party is important, but countering it by saying that we'll elect Democrats regardless of whether or not they give a hoot about our issues is one of the reasons why Democrats are still losing policy debates even when they win elections.
It's true that we live in an era of the strong party caucus, but that is contributing to our problems, not helping to solve them.
As to "yammering about Lieberman"... if you want to talk about Gordon Smith, fine. What is your complaint about Gordon Smith, if any, on SCHIP? Do you agree or disagree with him about the funding mechanism? Do you agree or disagree that he voted the right way on the issue?
Oct 24, '07
"Your notion of "a campaign that talked about issues" is entirely based on what you saw of Gary Hart in person. He didn't have any issue content on his website; because he didn't have a website."
Kari--how do you know that? Did you know me back in 1984? Did you know that the organizer of his campaign was a former White House Fellow who, as a friend of the Hart family, knew a lot about where he stood on many issues?
No, there was no website---in the old "analog " days, we had a table full of issue papers: Hart on defense, Hart on education, etc. in our campaign HQ. We could give them out to others, or read them and tell others about them.
And as a Senator, he already had a voting record and bills he had sponsored such as Judicial Review and the American Defense Education Act (as I recall, that made funding of education a national security issue, like it was right after Sputnik).
I have seen Steve speak in person a few months ago, and Jeff give a speech to a tribute dinner in 2006 which convinced me he would be an excellent Speaker--which he was.
Maybe my complaint is that they seem to be "preaching to the choir" in the way they discuss issues. Steve spoke as if everyone in the audience already had certain basic knowledge about politics which the 18 year old I had brought with me didn't have and perhaps the recent college grad across the table didn't have either.
The candidates need to talk in a way that reaches out to the 95% of the electorate who may never in their lives have worked on a campaign but might be inspired to vote for a candidate who they decided was talking substance: like the swing voter I know who with some urging went to see Denny Smith and John Kitzhaber talk to Rotary in 1994.
The impression he had was Denny was just another slick politician, and "Kitzhaber had so much substance I took notes--do you want to hear them?".
I know all about concentric circles--motivate the people with experience and influence and they will mobilize their friends who will mobilize there friends, who will mobilize their friends. But does that mean everyone Jeff and Steve have met in their political careers should be excited by one or the other and choose up sides this early without the candidates doing much to attraact them other than fundraising appeals and requests for volunteers?
Billy Shore describes concentric circle campaigning in his book REVOLUTION OF THE HEART. Gary Hart and Billy Shore used that to win New Hampshire in 1984. (If you don't know who he is, Bill Shore (known as Billy to some of us from the Hart campaign) went on to co-found the anti-hunger organization Share Our Strength.)
Maybe what I am saying is that the Hart-Shore combination did inspired campaigning. So far, what I have seen is that Frohnmayer-Peralta is closer to Hart-Shore than either of the Democratic candidates and their top aides.
If by January both Dem websites can't have expanded their issues sections to something like:
Jeff on veterans and the military With my Pentagon background I know the following things are important... (with bullet points)
or
Steve on working Americans and health care My mother was a waitress, and my experience with the health care system tells me we need...(with bullet points)
I will worry.
Steve and I have discussed this sort of thing. Turned out he wrote detailed papers on issues for Bruggere and somehow they didn't get distributed to the general public as expected. My sense is that no one on any of the 2008 Senate campaigns is that stupid, but after 30 years as an activist there are very few things I take on faith anymore.
In early 2004 I went to a family wedding rehearsal dinner in the Portland area. As we were leaving, the groom's cousin put on his coat and there was a Tom Potter button on it. That is also part of the concentric circles approach--an ordinary citizen wearing a button in public can stimulate conversations about the candidate which the campaign didn't need to start by themselves.
Kari, you said " All campaigns work from the inside circle of supporters outward - eventually talking to voters just prior to balloting. By then, both campaigns will be loaded for bear. Right now, they're both working real hard to organize the folks that already know them".
I knew Jeff and Steve (actually Steve longer than Jeff) before they announced for US Senate. What concerns me is whether either of them will be able to inspire an ordinary person (like the abovementioned groom's cousin) to wear a button for them in early 2008.
Or is there a rigid campaign plan which says "by this date we start talking to ordinary voters" as if that will make it happen?
I've worked on "impossible campaigns" (some won--like Hart, some did better than expected) where bottom up true grass roots ("let me tell you why I am supporting my friend" ) campaigns did more to generate support than all the ads, infrastructure, etc. could ever do.
As I read YOU HAVE THE POWER, that is Dean's philosophy, not "we're professionals, we know what we are doing" consultants telling the rest of us they know how to run campaigns, so we should just accept their wisdom, choose a campaign and volunteer on it without asking tough questions.
5:33 p.m.
Oct 24, '07
I agree with LT. Gary Hart was one of my Senators growing up in Colorado. He was, and still remains, as sharp as they come on policy issues -- particularly with regard to foreign policy. He was not one to rely on polls and focus groups to tell him what to think and say, and I never once saw Gary Hart hiding behind surrogates, either when it came to campaign message or when it came time to take tough positions.
<h2>LT, I'm up for coffee in Salem anytime you can do it. I have no idea how to get hold of you, and since my phone number is floating out there on the intertubes already, you can reach me at 503-437-2833 if you want t meet up.</h2>