I have been involved in presidential elections in various capacities over the years. Some of the time I was on the inside and, other times my involvement was several steps away from the decision makers. In most cases, however, because of my involvement over the many years with the Republican Party and the United States Congress, I had access to the people calling the shots in the campaign. This gave me an inside look at how the campaigns were run.
Right now both parties are evaluating what states will receive most of their financial and political resources. Remember, with less than sixty days to go, it is impossible for a presidential candidate to be in all states and difficult for them to spend all the time they would like in key battleground states. Let me give you an example. The Republican Party feels that the Midwest is a key to the election. This means that the Republicans must win Ohio. It also means that it would be helpful if they could pick up the states that Democrats normally win like Michigan. Michigan has high unemployment and the Democratic governor is getting blamed. Just recently, the Democratic mayor of Detroit has had to resign and is going to prison. Governor Mitt Romney is campaigning hard for McCain. His father was governor of Michigan a number of years ago. Will this be a battleground state?
Forget what you read in the paper or on the Internet. Just look at McCain’s schedule. If he is not making many visits to Michigan, scratch this from a battleground state and put it in the Democratic column. You can use this example to figure out the national strategy of each party. Take a map and put a large star in any alleged battleground state each time a presidential candidate appears and a smaller star when the vice presidential candidate appears. You will have a visual depiction of the campaign strategy. This doesn’t mean that changes won’t be made as polls show progress or lack of progress.
Let me once again go back to what I have experienced. I was the Ford Chairman in Florida in 1976. Democratic Presidential Candidate Jimmy Carter was 33 points ahead of President Ford when the Democratic Convention ended. Carter being from Georgia, had some popularity in Florida and in other southern states. With about three weeks left in the campaign, the question arose, “Should we write-off Florida or write-off Texas?” We didn’t have the money to do both nor did we have the ability to put President Ford in both of those states. I made my case through Dick Cheney in the White House. I felt we had a chance to win Florida and we couldn’t win Texas. My arguments fell on deaf ears. Money was pulled from Florida and put into Texas. Publicly we never said we were writing Florida off, but no visits by Ford and no money said it all. We lost both Texas and Florida and barely lost the election. If we would have won Florida, Ford would have been president.
You can also get a sense of the campaign by the attack adds. For instance, it is clear that the Obama campaign believes that the biggest liability McCain has is President Bush. Ad after ad is aimed at tying Bush into McCain and saying that if McCain is elected it is just another four more years of the Bush administration. It’s a smart political ad as President Bush has some of the lowest approval ratings of any president since poll taking has become an art. On the other hand, you can see that Palin is causing the Obama campaign major problems. They have scheduled a large series of television ads attacking Palin. Furthermore, Biden is focusing as much on Palin as he is on McCain. The problem the Democrats have is her experience and Obama’s are arguably about the same. This issue is not beneficial to the Obama campaign. If Palin wasn’t effective, she would not be getting all this attention. If all of a sudden, the ads that are attacking her go away and both Obama and Biden start to ignore her, you know the polls are showing that her impact has lessened. Remember, negative attacks work. If they didn’t work, candidates would not use them year after year.
Also follow the money. See which states are getting the most dollars. Are the Republicans pouring money in Ohio and Pennsylvania, or just Ohio? Have the Democrats pulled money from Florida to put in Ohio? The Republican campaign can say that they will win Pennsylvania, but if the money doesn’t follow, its nonsense.
The bottom line is, forget the hype and use your common sense. This is not illegal although it appears to be rare. In a country of nearly 300,000,000 people, there is much a candidate wants to do and can not do. Each day is precious and must be used only after a great deal of thought has gone into that particular day. The candidate must be ready to take advantage of a stumble made by the opponent in a debate or campaigning. Remember the problem Jerry Ford had regarding Poland, or George H. W. Bush looking at his watch during the presidential debate, or Kerry’s speech when he said he voted for the war before he voted against it? The data the campaigns have is massive. How they use it will probably dictate who wins another close presidential race.
In summary, follow the money; follow the candidates. Remember a day in politics is a lifetime. Next week we will discuss a major, somewhat-lethal disease that has impacted both parties over the years.
