Results in this type of polling come from questions like: Would you be more or less inclined to vote for someone who is a veteran?

I know the system we have isn’t perfect. In a perfect world (or at least, my perfect world), it wouldn’t take an arm and a leg to run for office. That keeps a whole lot of people out of the process. And I think that’s a shame.

That’d be nice, but it’s largely infeasible strategically. When you collect money as a conduit or a bundler, you have to be collecting it for someone specific–you can’t start raising money knowing that a certain district is going to be competitive until a candidate files, which means you’re sitting on your hands for a year. Consider: under your proposed system for strategically funding races, the DCCC wouldn’t be able to do *anything* to support a candidate against Thelma Drake because we don’t have anyone to collect money for yet. And if there was theoretically a primary in a district? They wouldn’t be able to start raising money until around March when the nominee was finally decided.

And most of what Lowell has posted in this thread is exactly what I heard from people close to the campaign.

RD – I know there were some sour grapes after the convention but I don’t think it was anything about the “wrong kind of Democrat.” As usual, the divide was north and south. Nevertheless, at least on this end, I didn’t see any rancor about the candidate.

anon – I’d rather see the DCCC act as a conduit in terms of directing those donors from non-competitive districts to contribute directly to campaigns that are competitive, rather than being on the receiving end of those contributions and they (the DCCC) decide which ones to spend the money on.

I agree entirely. Not only does this make sure the money goes to the candidates you want, it allows that candidate and his campaign direct control over how the money is spent. Giving money to the DCCC does not accomplish that.

On the other hand, I do think the DCCC plays a very valuable role in helping to take money from donors in non-competitive Democratic districts (and from the Members who represent those districts themselves) and applying it to help candidates in competitive districts that otherwise wouldn’t be on the radar screens for those Democratic donors. I won’t begrudge them for thinking this one race wasn’t a responsible use of donors’ contributions, and I look forward to their involvement in competitive races around Virginia in the future.

1. Between VA-01 and OH-05 the Republicans spent about 20-30% of their cash on hand, all to hold onto seats that they shouldn’t have to worry about.

2. I think that the gaint marathon convention the Republicans had actually helped them because it gave them several hours of “face time” together to network and get fired up about the race.

3. Conversely, the Democratic convention ended on a sour note between Democrats from the North and South part of VA-01 complaining about the results, hurt feelings, etc. I think the Democratic 1st CD committee has some work to do in terms of building unity and infrastructure and reminding folks who our opponents really are. There are too many people in Democratic committees who would rather see the Republican win than “the wrong kind of Democrat.” That kind of thinking undermines a party’s ability to organize on short notice for a fight like a special election.

4. While I would have liked to have seen a modest investment from the DCCC simply to force the RNCC to spend more money that it doesn’t have, in view of #3, I can understand why they didn’t.

Good points, anon. Even so, I still think it’s better to help the candidates directly rather than relying on the DCCC or any other organization to fill the void.

As far as the DCCC goes: the DCCC receives donations from across the country (not only in Virginia), and while activists in Virginia are invariably going to be pissed off when they don’t swoop in like Uncle Moneybags from Monopoly to spend frivolously on campaigns in their state, donors from states like Florida or California or New York are invariably pissed off when the DCCC blows through a cool $5 million on special elections in districts that haven’t voted for a Democrat in two decades and wonder why their money is being wasted. They’re a national organization with a whole lot of people that they’re responsible to, and so someone is always going to be pissed off at them, even when they’re winning more than the lose.

Perhaps especially when.

I agree with Vivian complaints about the DCCC not seeing an interest where Virginia Dem activists saw an interest does, indeed, reiterate the point that all politics is local. I disagree with a lot of people who want to make the DCCC a scapegoat. Anyone who thinks that a sack full of national party money is going to reverse a 20 point loss really does need to learn to heed Vivian’s constant reminder of Tip O’Neils mantra because apparently the DCCC remembers that All Politics is Local a lot better than you do.