Comments on: A bloodbath

By: A sober look at Deeds’ pollster Petts « VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:14:20 +0000

[...] sober look at Deeds’ pollster Petts In my earlier post, I mentioned some consultants who should never work in politics again. I’m not generally one [...]

By: Scott

Scott — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:19:27 +0000

I’m a bit more pessimistic about 2013 Dem chances with Bolling the probable nominee. I think Bill Bolling is a tough nut to crack, he avoids debating and plays the game like hes way ahead. Too bad we could not have won that Lt Gov race, that way it would have perhaps been Cuccinelli versus Wagner in 2013. And we have a lot of ammunition to fire a Cucinelli.

By: Anon E. Mouse

Anon E. Mouse — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:14:16 +0000

“Republicans… also hate the poor…”

Right. That’s why conservatives, despite having generally less income than liberals, give more to charity — more money, more time, and even more blood.

Democrats are very generous with other people’s money.

By: Alma Kesling

Alma Kesling — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 18:20:38 +0000

Tuesday’s losses had little to do with not getting health care reform pushed through. Americans hate the weak. They just do, especially Republicans, who also hate the poor, and honestly think being poor is contagious. If the Democrats would just show a backbone, more Independents would’ve stayed with us. Just look at how many people love Alan Grayson from Florida!

My opinion, though, is that the Virginia Democrat Party lost the races for their candidates. When volunteers called with problems from several precincts, they never got solved, and we lost so many voters in Democrat precincts simply because they had no place to park.

By: rlewis

rlewis — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:23:03 +0000

maybe, just maybe, the voters didn’t like what the Dems had to offer regardless of how well they did or didn’t campaign. I realize it is above the Dems to concede that their candidate is not a good choice and his ideas would not make sense for the state or nation for that matter! stop being so full of yourselves for god sake!! accept defeat and stop trying to make excuses on why he lost. Deeds lost because he was not a good candidate, period!!

By: laura

laura — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:31:36 +0000

I would say that the combined campaign in my city was aweful. Attitudes took over.
Election day was aweful as they had not worked with the local committee for the polls. They just piggy backed after spending all that money for what??
I set up the poll workers and half of the volunteers never showed up thanks to the media saying we were way behind.
Where were the voters?? They were never inspired.

By: vjp

vjp — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:29:03 +0000

A candidate has to answer two questions: why to fire/not hire the other guy, plus why to hire him/her. It’s too easy to focus only on the first question and to ignore the second. And yes, I think our candidates did too much of that.

By: vjp

vjp — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:26:49 +0000

Yes, I’m aware that Deeds was the candidate most feared by McDonnell. But both camps missed something that I was told was true in politics: run against a candidate you’ve previously lost to and you’ll likely lose by a larger margin.

Oh – and you’re welcome

By: vjp

vjp — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:25:12 +0000

I had that same reaction, Steve. In fact, I asked that question of the campaign. And I agree – it would have been a different world.

But here’s a sad truth: the campaign didn’t locate the thesis this year, either. Had it not been mentioned by McDonnell & followed up on by the Post, they wouldn’t have found it.

By: Anon E. Mouse

Anon E. Mouse — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:49:42 +0000

The problem with that theory, Steve, is that the majority of the people in Virginia agree with the majority of that thesis.

By: Steve Vaughan

Steve Vaughan — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:31:23 +0000

The person Creigh Deeds should be most angry at:
Whoever did his opposition research in 2005 and FAILEd to turn up that thesis.
As Viv said, it couldn’t overcome the goodwill that McDonnell had built up with voters this year.
But I have to believe it could have moved at least 400 votes statewide and changed the result of the 2005 attorney general race.
That would have left Creigh coming into this year as the incumbent A.G. and likely unopposed Dem nominee to face Bill Bolling for governor.
What a different world that might have been.

By: Bobs4Jobs

Bobs4Jobs — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:13:54 +0000

Fascinating analysis. Pretty accurate. Bob was an excellent candidate with an excellent message. At the same time, Deeds made it too easy.
Based on my personal conversations with 2 high ranking McDonnell staffers, Deeds was suppose to the toughest challenger. We all thought that Deeds would try to hijack the “Bob4Jobs” message. Foolishly, he didn’t. Instead, he wanted to debate a thesis or highlight that Bob is claiming that he is from NOVA, Virginia Beach etc. Bonehead move.

The Deeds campaign was a gift to Virginia Republicans. Thank you.

By: virginiadem

virginiadem — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 04:45:36 +0000

Very interesting and thoughtful analysis Vivian and yes “The work begins again.” … I’ve posted what I think the work is … “Virginians who voted in 2009 accurately reflected the Democratic and Republican Parties “core base” of voters … translation … when only 40% of registered voters show up … Virginia Republicans have a base of approximately 950,000 … Democrats can count on a base of around 750,000 … “independent” voters numbering nearly 300,000 have to break strongly Democratic to have our candidates win Commonwealth wide elections … we have to make up the ground by giving folks a reason to vote for Democrats … and/or we must increase voter turnout … our goal should be to convert 200,000 voters from independents into Democrats to level the playing field .. and/or reach out to 200,000 folks who voted in Presidential election and move them into the dependable annual “core base” of Democratic voters”

By: Anon E. Mouse

Anon E. Mouse — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 04:03:39 +0000

Yeah, I seems to recall a liberal blogger or two trying to make something out of that thesis, too.

By: Scott Cohen

Scott Cohen — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:58:40 +0000

Deeds got a boost from the primary. But the problem was that he just let things spiral out of control after getting that boost. He should have ran a campaign like Warner and Kaine- one on bread and butter issues, and not divisive social issues. Money aside, he ran a much better race in 2005 despite being outspent. His message was wrong– and thus no money or volunteers were enthused enough to support him. I think we could have salvaged one of the downballot races.. maybe Wagner or Shannon could have came through. But again, Wagner and Shannon did not really focus on issues and spent most of the time telling us why we should not vote for their opponents. I really think Wagner could have won this race and she could have performed much better in Hampton Roads. Voters will split ticket.. take 2005 as an example. Creigh was a lost cause. Surprised, Wagner and Shannon did not try to distance themselves and run on substance.

By: vjp

vjp — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 02:41:36 +0000

Oh I think the primary was huge. Not just the money it tied up but the two months afterwards, when Creigh was locked down raising money and Joe Abbey was trying to put the general election campaign team together. The Deeds campaign was silent while McDonnell had the airwaves to himself. He used the time to define himself. By the time Deeds got back in the game, McDonnell was way ahead. That’s why he was able to deflect the thesis: he had built up so much goodwill that folks were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt when he said he hand changed.

By: msk08

msk08 — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 02:23:47 +0000

Vivian, I like your analysis. I wouldn’t necessarily view the primary as being a stumbling block in the race, since that’s when Deeds got his first boost in name recognition and reputation as a positive campaigner and a problem solver. But there is certainly a chasm between pre-primary and post-primary Deeds in which he completely lost focus, lost the voters’ attention, lost the base, and even lost the Deeds Country which he concocted.

To be fair, I think that even if Deeds had been a stellar candidate (or if one of the other Democrats had headed the ticket), McDonnell still would have squeaked by due to the structural forces at work in this election cycle. But the 18-point gap between the two men suggests that from September-onward, the folks at Deeds HQ were oblivious to the opinion polls that showed voters turning away from him. At that point, party leaders, including Tim Kaine, should have stepped up and demanded either a change in tone or a purge of the misguided consultants.

Oh well. Time to look forward to 2013 and the race against Bill Bolling.

By: vjp

vjp — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 02:13:40 +0000

Careful on the exit polls: they are crap. Less about reporting the news than making the news. But I agree: the participation level is affected by horse-race reporting.

By: Missy Schmidt

Missy Schmidt — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:58:44 +0000

from the NY Times: “exit polls conducted by Edison Research…suggested that many of Mr. Obama’s voters stayed home on Tuesday, allowing Mr. McDonnell to win on strong support among white men and independents…”

What has/is happening to our democracy? I’m not talking about who won or who lost, but that turnout was VERY low… and women and minorities especially didn’t turn out to vote.

While I detest the “blame game,” I can only think that the constant poll-reporting in the media (1) keeps people from making their own minds and following the crowd, i.e. “lemming mentality” and (2) keeps the disenfranchised/disengaged away from voting, thinking that their vote doesn’t matter.

By my calculations, less than 33% of registered voters in Hampton Roads placed one on Tuesday. That’s just sad.

By: Silver Donkey

Silver Donkey — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:03:36 +0000

AMEN SISTER!

By: Tweets that mention A bloodbath « VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local -- Topsy.com

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Vivian J. Paige and Amaka , Dave Hendrickson. Dave Hendrickson said: Vivian Paige writes a great, and scathing, critique of yesterday's performance by the Dems: http://tinyurl.com/yadhquj [...]

By: kenr

kenr — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:51:55 +0000

Vivian,

As always great detailed analysis!

By: genemagruder

genemagruder — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:40:59 +0000

You hit it right on target. Been saying the same things for month. How many times I said leave me alone about health careafter it wasn’t done in August like the president wanted. (no comment on that)Then wondering why we hadn’t wrapped up the base in the three populated areas- Nova, richmon, and hampton roads. Amen to you Vivian