I promise to get to Kevin O’Holleran's column in just a moment. But first I feel I need to say something to all the idiot Democratic Operatives who still manage to find jobs:
You know, up until the Pelosi/Obama era, it was pretty damn tough to be a Democrat. Democrats had a consultant problem. Progressives like me kept screaming on blogs like this and in emails to our candidates to sac up, fight, and run on our principles. But for years national campaigns kept rehiring you imbeciles and we kept getting our collective ass handed to us.
I remember when you mocked Howard Dean's 50 state strategy. (Because only focusing on the coasts and Illinois worked so well for us.)
I remember when you told us not to bring up national defense issues. (Another brilliant stroke. Somehow talking about it would show how "tough" the other guys were.)
Ah yes, and then there was Kerry's convention. Keep it nice. (Don't want to attack Bush too much, lest we come across as "mean".)
And for years...YEARS... you told candidates to avoid the gun debate at all costs. We conceded so much on that issue that any reasonable regulation at all (forget the "well-regulated" in the Constitution) was met with contempt and outrageous indignation.
And we lost, lost, and lost again.
Things finally changed for us in 2005. Howard Dean took over the DNC that year and started to fight everywhere. Nancy wasn't worried about "looking mean". Obama took national defense head on. He also deliberately ignored the consultant class and relied on his own people. And we actually started winning. Amazing what happens when you start doing the opposite of what you have been told.
Gun control was still taboo. People thought the NRA was all powerful. There was a time, like a decade ago, when it probably was. Hell, a decade ago, the GOP put gay marriage on ballots to motivate THIER base! But things change.
After Newtown, Americans couldn't turn their backs on the out-of-control gun culture the NRA cultivated in this nation. The majority of Senators in Congress voted for reasonable, sane gun legislation. Amazingly, the Dems in red states didn't lose any support, but the GOP Senators, especially in red or purple states, took a huge hit in the polls.
But alas, all that matters as evidence to the consultant class is the special recall elections in Colorado. Even though most people in CO support gun control, only the gun nuts bothered to show up to vote.
The consultant class extrapolated that this means to give up the fight and focus on other issues.
The only problem here is that this absolutely IGNORES what happened in Virginia.
Terry McAuliffe didn't run from gun control. Hell, he took the NRA head on! In the debate where Cuccinelli bragged about his A rating and told the audience that McAuliffe got an F, Terry replied:
“I don’t care what grade I got from the NRA. I never want to see another Newtown or Aurora or Virginia Tech again.”
The Colorado Independent featured an article yesterday entitled Ready, fire, aim: In VA, Dems favored gun control and won:
McAuliffe’s views on gun control are not much different from what passed in Colorado. Universal background checks. Closing gun show loopholes. Limiting magazine capacities. If McAuliffe won on these issues in Virginia and three state senators lost on them in Colorado, that suggests the issue is a little more complicated than it seems. It also suggests that even politics is not always a zero-sum game.
Kevin O’Holleran managed Mark Herring’s successful campaign for Virginia attorney general. His opponent was about as different as one could expect.
And Kevin got all kinds of advice from the pundit class. In an op-ed he wrote for WaPo yesterday entitled "
Support for gun control helped a candidate win in Virginia", he plainly put it all down:
As manager of Mark Herring’s campaign for attorney general, I got a lot of advice. One of the things I heard most frequently was that we should soft-pedal his strong record and advocacy for sensible gun legislation. It would hurt us outside of Northern Virginia and wasn’t a voting issue within the Beltway, I was told.
Like much conventional wisdom, this was wrong — and we not only ignored this advice but did the opposite.
MOST Americans support intelligent, comprehensive background checks and ending the gun-show loophole that allows any violent felon to buy unlimited, dangerous firearms. Only the gun nuts support otherwise. O'Holleran brought it home in the final two paragraphs:
The swing vote began to shift dramatically in our favor at the end. When the ballots were counted in Northern Virginia, Herring not only beat Obenshain there by more than 100,000 votes, but he also increased the total Democratic vote in Northern Virginia for attorney general by more than 124,000 since the last election. A post-election survey of voters in Northern Virginia by the Global Strategy Group indicated that 57 percent of those who voted for Herring in Northern Virginia believe gun issues had a major impact on the way they voted.
This massive increase wasn’t just about the mechanics of campaigning. The painful and numbing record of senseless gun violence — from Columbine High School in Colorado to Virginia Tech to Newtown, Conn., and, during the heart of the fall campaign, the Navy Yard shooting — was the real determinant of voters’ sentiments. Our campaign pointed out the contrast, and voters lined up on our side. Even the NRA’s active opposition in its home state could not change the fact that voters rejected our opponent’s radical position on gun safety. Those perpetuating the conventional wisdom should take notice: In the end, voters were calling out for action on gun violence, and they flocked to the candidate who offered progress and a sensible, mainstream approach to protecting Virginians.
Well said, sir.
Look, the gun nuts are ALWAYS going to vote for the extremist candidate... do you think not talking about guns will somehow demotivate them from showing up and voting against you? It won't. But trying to appease them by not talking about gun violence WILL demotivate your own damn base. That is a guarantee.
Advocating background checks and ending the gun-show loophole will NOT lose you any moderate voters, who are with you, but it will increase left and left-leaning turnout. All you have to do to win is not be afraid to stand on your own principles.
In the former red state of Virginia, Dems control every statewide office. They all ran on gun control and won. So you candidates in 2014 have a choice to make: listen to the consultant class and follow the 2004 playbook, or learn from the successful campaigns this year.
Your call....
HT PDC