Bill Richardson ads

[behindthebook]

Okay, just watched the new Bill Richardson TV ads on youtube. . . .
I like Richardson. I like his energy policy and he's the only candidate in the Democratic field with serious executive experience, he maybe the ideal résumé candidate, but these ads rub me the wrong way. You don't go for comedy when you’re running for commander in chief during a war. Am I the only one who thinks these strike the wrong tone?

[Darth Turkish]

Dem's fightin' werds, bub!

[Trent Lawless]

behindthebook said:

You don't go for comedy when you’re running for commander in chief during a war.

Then why do I laugh every time a new lie comes out of the mouth of a member of the Bush administration?

Seriously, though, I'm fine with these ads. I'm still a John Edwards guy, but Richardson is certainly worth more attention than he's been getting. He has to do something to stand out from the pack, and this is his attempt. It probably won't work, but what the heck, why not?

[azfan]

I saw that. I like Richardson actually. I've seen him in interviews, he seems common sense, with real answers. I don't know how some of the front runner become front runners.

[Trent Lawless]

azfan said:

I saw that. I like Richardson actually. I've seen him in interviews, he seems common sense, with real answers. I don't know how some of the front runner become front runners.

"M - O - N - E - Y,
M - O - N - E - Y,
M - O - N - E - Y,
and MONEY is its name-o."

Sad but true.

[mft]

markcpc said:

azfan said:

I saw that. I like Richardson actually. I've seen him in interviews, he seems common sense, with real answers. I don't know how some of the front runner become front runners.

"M - O - N - E - Y,
M - O - N - E - Y,
M - O - N - E - Y,
and MONEY is its name-o."

Sad but true.

...well, money and because one front runner is black and the other is a woman

[Trent Lawless]

Then why didn't Carol Moseley Braun burn up the charts in '04? Black and female!

Come on, man. You're not that naive. You know how this game's played.

[azfan]

Obama didn't start out with money though. Plus i think in the case of Hillary it's just people saying for years that she's going to be the nominee. Kind of like in 96' the media told everybody for 6 months that Clinton was going to beat Dole, we had the lowest turnout at the polls. The funny thing is, of course, they always take these polls how the candidates are doing nationally, but in the primaries some of that doesn't hold up in the individual states. Romney is in 3rd or 4th in national polls, but in Iowa he was leading a couple weeks ago.

[Trent Lawless]

Obama didn't start out with money, true. But he started building it up before he announced officially, and by the time he announced, he was second among Dems to Hillary.

McCain and his campaign tanking both in the polls and financially shows the hand in hand nature of this stuff, too.

I'm not saying that a candidate who captures the zeitgeist can't get a good following without a whole lot of money (comparatively), but to win the presidential election, you've got to have it. Got to got to got to. Your message just won't get out otherwise except to the people already faithful to you.

EDIT: Plus it helps to have the support of your party's national committee or in the case of congressional elections, the congressional campaign committee. Then you get even more money. Ask Sherrod Brown in Ohio how that worked out for him. Then ask Paul Hackett, one of his Democratic challengers for Mike DeWine's senate seat. You'll get way different answers.

[azfan]

Yes that's true. Actually they talked on Meet the Press yesterday. Romney is leading in Iowa, and New Hampshire. If he wins both, momentum jumps to his side. Still i blame the media for a lot of it. They ram it down people's throat who is leading the polls, who has the most money, so people just discount the other candidates before a vote is cast. Heck, i like Joe Biden as well.

[Trent Lawless]

Yeah, but that is unfortunately what the media's job is nowadays. It's considered news how much a candidate raises, and let's be honest, a guy like Biden, Dodd, or Gravel; or on the other side Brownback, Hunter, or Tancredo just doesn't have the name recognition going into the thing that will help them over the hump.

I'd be interested, though, to go back and see how Bill Clinton did it in '92, being a governor from an ignored state to winning the presidency. Not sure what kind of funds he had going in. I think I'll check into that. There might be a lesson in there for the second-tier guys if money wasn't overflowing for Bill.

[Highway61Revisited]

Bill may have been from a forgotten state, but he himself wasn't exactly forgotten. He introduced Michael Dukakis at the 1988 Democratic Convention, which is perhaps the worst speech ever given at those masturbatory frivolities, but he quickly made amends for it with his self-deprecating appearance on the Tonight Show.

The way Bill Clinton won the Presidency, as it is so brilliantly shown in D.A. Pennebaker's The War Room, was essentially by being the anti-Jimmy Carter. There were things that Bill presented left-of-center positions on, i.e. Healthcare and abortion. But he moderated those positions by taking right-of-center positions on the death penalty and welfare.

I see the point you're making, but I disagree with it for a few reasons, but one major:

You aren't going to "OutClinton" a Clinton. Agree or disagree, and I strongly disagree, with Hillary Clinton she's running an intelligent campaign. She, like Bill, has become the master of the soundbite. From the "The President of the United States doesn't deal in hypotheticals" line during the first CNN debate to her seemingly level-headed decision not to speak with enemy leaders at the last CNN debate she's resonating with the people.

Because she's playing Bill Clinton's game and she's playing it exceptionally well. The point made yesterday on Meet The Press that she's turning Obama into a Paul Tsongas/Gary Hart type candidate is absolutely right. She's established the Democratic constituency that helped her husband win in '92.

So it wasn't so much an issue of cash, though the figures for Clinton had to be high, Clinton's mixture of political genius (Begala, Carville, and Stephanopoulos), moderate politics, and the mastering of the soundbite were his success in '92.

Spinning Paul Tsongas' win in New Hampshire as a victory for the Clinton campaign didn't hurt either. You saw Howard Dean try and do this in 2004 and it was pitiful. Really, really pitiful.

[Trent Lawless]

Oh, I agree, you won't out-Clinton Hillary, but it's possible the nomination could be won another route if the primary voters/caucusers see a different way around. That may be giving them too much credit.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. I'm an Edwards guy. I think if you put Hillary Clinton against Mitt Romney, Romney will win and then look where we'll be for another four years. I give her better odds against Rudy.

[Highway61Revisited]

A few things:

1) I'm kind of Edwards by default right now. In a perfect world, I'd be voting for Dennis Kucinich, but it's far from that so my current candidate is Edwards. That will most likely change depending on what happens in New Hampshire and Iowa. Again, in my Utopian dreams Obama and Edwards would split the two, going one and two in the races and putting Hillary at a distant third.

The most realistic of scenarios, by current political climate, would be Hillary and Obama splitting New Hampshire and Iowa. But if Edwards can grab second at Iowa, things could look better. It will be interesting to see how well either Hillary or Obama do in the South and Midwest, because if Edwards gains momentum and takes the South and portions of the Midwest, we could have legitimate race on our hands.

2) If it comes down to Romney/Hillary, what would the differences be, really? Hillary doesn't have a plan to fix our broken health system, she still supports free trade/globalization, she essentially said during the YouTube debate that she isn't willing to meet with our adversaries abroad, and her foreign policy resembles that of a Neo-Con wonk.

So, sadly, instead of being able to vote for the person I think would best represent our country, when I step into the voting booth next year I'll be voting against Hillary Clinton.

[azfan]

I don't really agree about Biden and name recognition. He's not as anonymous as some of them. I remember him from the Clarence Thomas hearings.

[behindthebook]

azfan said:

Yes that's true. Actually they talked on Meet the Press yesterday. Romney is leading in Iowa, and New Hampshire. If he wins both, momentum jumps to his side. Still i blame the media for a lot of it. They ram it down people's throat who is leading the polls, who has the most money, so people just discount the other candidates before a vote is cast. Heck, i like Joe Biden as well.

The press rams the polls and money down our throats because the process story is always easier to cover then the substance.

azfan said:

I don't really agree about Biden and name recognition. He's not as anonymous as some of them. I remember him from the Clarence Thomas hearings.

I mainly remember Biden from the plagiarism scandal that forced him out of the 88 primaries (Leaving the party Michael ‘f’n’ Dukakis, thank you very much). But then again, I’m old and have a long memory.

Apparently all the second tier Dems are trying for the comedy approach. See Chris Dodd and his White Hare ads.

[Trent Lawless]

Biden has some name recognition, more than Mike Gravel, let's say, but it's generally not good. (As mentioned about '88.) He also made a comment last year that wasn't terribly sensitive to the Indian (from India, not native) population.

[behindthebook]

I think Biden and Dodd are really, at this point, running for the VP spot. There's a school of thought that says that is either Clinton or Obama get the nomination, they will need some one like Dodd or Biden (that is to say experienced, old, Caucasian males) to balance the ticket.