Clintons Preparing Now for 2008
Hillary Rodham Clinton is determined to win the US Presidency in 2008 for the Democratic Party and her willingess to raise and spend as much as it may cost underscores the seriousness of her efforts thus far. Raw Story says:
Despite continuing insistence from Clinton’s campaign team that her only focus is the Senate, her extensive pursuit of donors nationwide – along with her staggering success in wooing them – has solidified expectations of a presidential run in 2008. Any funds left over from her senatorial campaign, which Time recently estimated might exceed $10 million, could be used to seed a presidential run. RAW STORY
Even considering the prospect of a 2008 campaign for the White House, Clinton’s receipts are remarkable. According to Massie Ritsch, no presidential aspirant has ever raised so much this far in advance of an election. http://www.rawstory.com/...
A New York Times graphic published this week documented the massive preparations for the 2008 elections that are already costing millions of dollars. NY TIMES GRAPHIC
A story published at the same time, and predicated on the idea that the spending was for her 2006 campaign, criticized the level of Clinton’s campaign spending for her November re-election, in which she won 70% of the vote and got 30% of Republicans votes. NY TIMES ARTICLE (Subscription required.)
In addition to spending on her own campaign, “Hillary’s political action committee donated to 42 congressional candidates, including $10,000 each to Bob Casey (D-PA) and Robert Menendez (D-NJ), both in tight midterm races.” Clinton campaigned at events for 22 local, state and national politicians. “Justin H. Phillips, a political science professor at Columbia University, who specializes in electoral outcomes said,
I think this money is being spent on what her strategy is for the Democratic nomination . . . JRN COLUMBIA.EDU
After these expenditures, the leftover pile of cash of nearly $14 million. That's more than twice as much as Barack Obama, Bill Frist, John McCain, John Edwards, and Rudy Giuliani have combined. JRN COLUMBIA.EDU CINCINATTI POST
But according to the online Political Wire,
Strategists from both parties estimate the White House race in 2008 could cost each nominee $500 million -- far more than the Presidential Election Campaign Fund can afford. As a result, this next presidential campaign could mark the first time in 30 years that the Democratic and Republican nominees turn down the fund's millions in both the primary and the general elections. POLITICAL WIRE
If the campaign is to cost 500 million per candidate, then the winning candidate, whether Democratic or Republican, will have spent an average 20 million dollars per month for each of the months between now and November 2008, not including monies spent on that candidate’s behalf by a political party and other organizations. POLITICAL WIRE
The Clinton campaign spending is solidly in line with this reality while other campaigns have yet to begin to invest in the infrastructure that the Republicans have used to such devastating advantage in previous Presidential and Congressional races. WASHINGTON POST
As an earlier American politician, Benjamin Franklin, was so fond of saying, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” http://www.ushistory.org/... With the Presidency in Republicans hands now, after two Democratic losses, the Clinton’s determination to spend as much as necessary on infrastructure now in order to win in 2008 is based on their experiences with Bill’s successful candidacies in 1992 and 1996. The Washington Post explains,
It takes money to pay a campaign staff and buy materials. It takes money for a campaign to be taken seriously by the press. It even takes money to raise more money.
Clintons Plan to Compete Dollar for Dollar With Republicans
Perhaps more than anything, it takes an awful lot of money to buy television and radio ads – which are virtually mandatory for any national political campaign and for many local and statewide ones as well . . .
(In 1996), A massive television advertising blitz that started in October 1995 greatly contributed to the Clinton reelection victory by retuning his image and drowning out any competing message. It didn't come cheap. The ads – which were paid for by the Democratic National Committee, not by the Clinton/Gore campaign – cost about $44 million. WA POST
Columnist Satirizes Sexist Double-Standards
Gerald Collins of the Onions satirizes the sexist double-standard implicit in criticisms of Senator Clinton; Many people have begun arguing that Hillary is "too ambitious" and should run for President without spending so much money on herself.
I'd rather see a female presidential candidate who wasn't so focused on herself and her political aspirations. It seems like she puts a lot of thought into every decision that she makes, as if every little move were planned ahead of time down to the smallest little detail. It's hard to pin down exactly why, but it just wouldn't feel right to see someone who is so politically calculating win those precious 270 electoral votes in the next election. THE ONION'S SATIRE OF ANTI-HILLARY SEXISM
Now, with the Republican National Party spending lavishly to bring its voters to the polls, including sophisticated databases already in existence as well as hot-button ballot initiatives in many battleground states, the Clinton camp believes that it would be imprudent to irresponsible to wait until August or September of 2008 to begin preparing for the November 2008 general election.
Instead, the Clintons are determined to build a national Presidential campaign with an independent strategy and resources in place one or two years in advance for identifying Democratic voters and getting them to the polls in November 2008 to vote for the Democratic ticket and support the Party’s candidates nationally.
Clinton Data Mining to Level Field for Dems in 2008
The pressure on Democrats to begin more aggressive "data mining" in the hunt for votes began after the 2002 midterm elections and intensified after the 2004 presidential contest, when the GOP harnessed data technology to powerful effect.
In 2002, for the first time in recent memory, Republicans ran better get-out-the-vote programs than Democrats. When well done, such drives typically raise a candidate's Election Day performance by two to four percentage points. Democrats have become increasingly fearful that the GOP is capitalizing on high-speed computers and the growing volume of data available from government files and consumer marketing firms -- as well as the party's own surveys -- to better target potential supporters.
The Republican database has allowed the party and its candidates to tailor messages to individual voters and households, using information about the kind of magazines they receive, whether they own guns, the churches they attend, their incomes, their charitable contributions and their voting histories.
This makes it possible to specifically address the issues of voters who, in the case of many GOP supporters, may oppose abortion, support gun rights or be angry about government use of eminent domain to take private property. A personalized pitch can be made during door-knocking, through direct mail and e-mail, and via phone banks. WA POST: REPUBS PREPARE EARLY
Crack Campaign Staff Gets Ready Early
As one Clinton strategist told New Republic about Clinton’s intense preparations,
"We are going to have our own field staff, starting way before the primaries begin, right through November 7." He points out that she is prepared to reject public financing during the primaries and the general election. (Clinton does not lack for money: She has raised $32.2 million for her Senate reelection and has $22 million in the bank--all transferable to her presidential campaign, according to PoliticalMoneyLine.)
This would allow her to keep the field staff she develops during the primaries on her payroll during the general election--instead of shifting it to the DNC, as previous candidates have done. Plus . . . Clinton strategist Harold Ickes recently established a private voter database to compete with a similar database being built by the DNC. Ickes's move--as well as Clinton's formidable array of experienced advisers, including Terry McAuliffe, Howard Wolfson, James Carville, Mark Penn, and others--will give Clinton added independence . . .
while the Democratic Party resolves its nominating process and is it moves to coalesce behind the nominee. NEW REPUBLIC
In the expectation that high voter turnout will be essential to a Democratic victory, the Clinton’s are absolutely determined to run a more professional and more comprehensive voter identification and mobilization effort than characterized past elections in which the Democratic candidate came up short.
So, the Clintons are already investing in the databases and apparatus to go head to head with Republicans in 2008.
Traditional get-out-the-vote efforts operated crudely, such as by canvassing neighborhoods in which at least 65 percent of residents voted for a particular party. It was often deemed too inefficient to focus on neighborhoods where the partisan tilt was less decisive, and it ran the risk of doing more to turn out the opposition's vote.
The advantage of data-based targeting is that political field operatives can home in on precisely the voters they wish to reach -- the antiabortion parishioners of a traditionally Democratic African American church congregation, for instance.
Consultants working for the Republican National Committee developed strategies to design messages targeting individual voters' "anger points" in the belief that grievance is one of the strongest motivations to get people to turn out on Election Day.
Under the direction of Bush adviser Karl Rove, the RNC and state parties repeatedly tested the voter file and different ways to contact voters to determine which were most effective at boosting turnout.
"They were smart. They came into our neighborhoods. They came into Democratic areas with very specific targeted messages to take Democratic voters away from us," then-DNC Chairman Terence R. McAuliffe said after the 2004 contest. "They were much more sophisticated in their message delivery." ROVE ON THE ATTACK
Meanwhile, it is impossible to know now how long and expensive the 2008 Democratic nominating campaign will be or when it will be decided. The Democratic Party apparatus’ loyalties are likely to be divided among candidates until the primaries are over, sometime between March and August 2008, leaving only three or four months to coordinate the Party’s efforts before the general election begins is earnest. Hillary has decided and already begun putting in place a national campaign apparatus able to get voters to the polls even in all of the states, without waiting for the Party apparatus to get all of its cogs in gear. The Clinton’s are accepting person responsibility for preparing for 2008 and are behaving accordindly. WA POST
Their efforts have already led to considerable free and favorable media about their unique fundraising prowess, with analysts discussing how she raises more funds than the other candidates.
Analysts point to the senator’s unique national prominence, stemming from her period as First Lady, and the generous nature of her present constituency in New York. The state ranks second only to California in money channeled to federal politics.
But while these factors have surely enhanced her fund-raising prowess, the bulk of her success stems from the amount of effort that she and her campaign team have dedicated to generating capital. The Clinton campaign operates an extremely organized and efficient fund-raising apparatus, comprised of three committees: Friends of Hillary, her Senate campaign fund; a “leadership committee” called HILLPAC; and a third organization aimed at buttressing Democratic representatives in New York.
Hillary Prepares National Network of Fund-Raisers for 2008
The senator has also zeroed in on extending her national network of giving to include more unlikely participants. Friends of Hillary has funneled the majority of its approximately $20 million in spending over the past five years into a direct-mail fundraising effort, one which has galvanized support among a surprisingly blue collar crowd.
Of the almost 50,000 individuals that gave to Clinton in the first quarter of this year, 95 percent gave $100 or less. A RAW STORY examination of Clinton’s latest financial disclosure forms found that nearly half of the Senator’s donations came from retirees, a majority of whom gave less than $30 at a time.
New York Times Smears the Democrats
With the New York Times criticizing Hillary Rodham Clinton for raising and spending money to become the first woman President of the United States, it’s clear they intend to inflame voters against the candidate with accusations of lavish spending. Anne Kornblut, who wrote the article attacking Hillary’s spending, also wrote the pre-election article claiming incorrectly that Joe Lieberman had never said “stay the course”, a claim that was later corrected at the insistence of bloggers who proved he had used the expression dozens of times. SALON
When these New York Times attack articles fail to provide contextual information such as the expected cost of the race or the amounts spent by the other Party during the same period, the risk is that voters could be manipulated into call for such manipulation, directed at Hillary and other Democratic candidates.
Early Money Is Like Yeast
But, Democrats have recognized the importance of early investments in campaigns and they refuse to be swayed by negative media characterizations. Emily’s List, a group that supports liberal women in local, state and national elections, rejects criticism of women candidates for raising and spending early on political campaigns, saying:
EMILY is an acronym for “Early Money Is Like Yeast” (it helps the dough rise). When EMILY’s List was founded, we knew that early money made women credible candidates and gave them the best shot at winning. That is still our organization’s goal: to help elect pro-choice Democratic women . . . When women are involved in the political process, our democracy is truly representative. When women make policy, the needs of women and families are not ignored. When women vote, Democrats -- who share our values and priorities -- win. EMILY'S LIST
UPDATE! Once again, a DailyKos participant has removed the Tags that would help other participants and the public to find a diary supporting the only liberal Democratic woman running for the Democratic nomination, even after 43 consecutive male presidencies.
I call upon whomever deleted the Tags to promptly replace the Tags in the interest of the free flow of speech, information and debate.
META UPDATE: Below, I was troll-rated for offering proof that Wesley Clark supported the US invasion of Iraq post-facto, in a 2003 in speech in which he congratulated Bush and criticized Bush's supporters. If the three websites I cited prove to be wrong, I will apologize.
Are you suggesting he didn't say what I quoted? (2+ / 1-)
Recommended by:
diplomatic, mattbrown
Trollrated by:
Sharon Jumper
Because whether he said it or not is a simple matter of fact that we can resolve right here and now. Check the THREE websites that I cited for that quote. WEBSITE I WEBSITE II WEBSITE III
Read and reason.
by francislholland on Sat Nov 25, 2006 at 11:06:08 AM PST
Since a troll-rating is an inappropriate response to the offer of legitimate citations proving a point, I call upon this DailyKos participant to either justify or remove the troll rating.